Paper Chromatographic Separation of Racemic Diphenylmethyl Alcohols Using Only Pure Water Surfactant Micellar Mobile Phase and Host—Guest Chromatography

This paper reports the separation of nine pairs of racemic diphenylmethyl alcohols with paper chromatography using hexadecyltrimethyl ammonium bromide pure water micellar solution as the mobile phase. The resulting resolution is excellent. The authors use a novel theory, host-guest chromatography, to describe the main driving force of chromatography on micellar paper and to discuss the retention behavior. The mechanism of micellar paper chromatography conforms to the Armstrong equation.