Preparation of an aspartame and N-isopropyl acrylamide copolymer functionalized stationary phase with multi-mode and chiral separation abilities.

A novel multi-mode and chiral separation stationary phase co-modified with copolymer composed of N-isopropyl acrylamide (NIPAM) and aspartame was synthesized by atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) reaction. The synthetic material was evaluated using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), Fourier transform infrared spectrometry (FT-IR) and elemental analysis (EA). Analytes including hydrophobic, hydrophilic, alkaline and acidic compounds were separated well using the prepared stationary phase named Sil-PPAM-NIPAM. Besides, the separation of chiral compounds proved that the developed column also has the potential of chiral separation ability. In summary, the prepared column possesses excellent hydrophilic interaction, ion exchange, reversed-phase and chiral separation modes during the separation of complex and chiral compounds.