Someone in our lab used water/MeCN/0.1%formic acid as MP and a underivatized silica as column packing amterial. I have not heard this before. When is this technique used? How to choose MP and especialy MP additives (pH etc.) to achieve selectivity? Could you please refer me to some helpful literature?

Thank you very much!

Noname,
I have seen this in an article about 30 years ago for basic pharm drugs.
Jim

You got the name right. It works like reversed-phase, only the other way around. You get higher retention with more acetonitrile, and more retention for (very) polar compounds. It is typically used for separating sugars and other very polar things.

If I'm rignt, I think that the term Hydrophilic interaction chromatography has been first proposed by A.J. Alpert in 1990 . Take a look at J. Chromatogr. 499 (1990) 177-196 where you'll find several exemples of hydrophilic compounds Retention mechanisms are also proposed.

Any polar column that can reasonably resist to water in the mobile phase can be used under this mode.

Hello, Uwe is right with his explanation. In addition, what he is calling "other very polar things", all polar compounds, not retained on RP-columns, are well retained on HILIC columns. HILIC has nothing to do with polar RP columns, or with polar endcapped RP-columns, or with AQ or aqua columns. There are several HILIC stationary phase polar functionalities available, Cyano, Amino, Alpha-cyclodextrin, polyhydroxyethyl Aspartamide and Amide! For a good reproducibility, use in LC-MS and other requirements, Amide functionality shows the best performance. Please note, it has nothing to do with "Amide" encapped polar RP-columns or with polar embedded RP-columns using "Amide" as polar embedded group. These HILIC columns have been introduced when many labs are focused on sugar analysis, but HILIC columns have a much broader range of compounds to be separated on, than most people "like" to think about.
Gerhard