Separation of Enantiomers by Thin-Layer Chromatography: An Overview

The present review discusses the versatile applicability and separation mechanisms of thin-layer chromatographic enantiomeric separations. More detailed descriptions will be given for practical applications—separations of underivatized samples—on commercially available, ready-to-use plates, focusing on the thin-layer chromatographic racemate separation based on ligand exchange, which was introduced in 1983 by G�nther et al. (1 ) and on use of a densitometer for determination of antipode distributions at trace level. This chapter will not discuss the numerous and interesting diastereomeric separations by paper and thin-layer chromatography (TLC). We refer to the literature on amino acids (2 –8 ), peptides, diketopiperazines (9 –18 ), and other classes of compounds (19 –31 ).