Phenols are widely distributed in nature and contribute to the phytochemical groups of plant pigments- and tannins. They also play an important role in the human body, e.g. dopamine. Therefore, a rapid separation and detection of these compounds is required.
The here presented investigations were performed on a microfluidic chip made from polycarbonate. Polycarbonate can be easily used for inexpensive single-use devices. The used chip contained a capillary electrophoresis (CE) unit and was equipped with a miniaturized electrochemical detector consisting of platinum electrodes. As a disadvantage of polycarbonate, electro-osmotic flow (EOF) of simple puffers inside the capillary is impossible.
Therefore, functionalization of the capillary in order to allow EOF was the main goal of this study. Suitable results were obtained with different silane reagents. Modified capillaries were tested with a set of phenols like dopamine and galic acid. Each phenol could be identified by a certain migration time.
