Separation of Nucleic Acids

The HPLC is a rapid separation method as illustrated by a comparison of separation of nucleic acids by HPLC and conventional ion-exchange chromatography in Figure.

(a)                                                        (b)

Figure: HPLC separation of nucleic acids: (a) on Zipax cation exchange packing using HPLC; and (b) using conventional ion-exchange chromatography

Whereas conventional ion-exchange method takes more than 2 hours for the separation of cytosine, uracil, guanine and adenine, it takes only 5 minutes by HPLC method requiring only microgram quantities.