UNDERSTANDING CAPILLARY ELECTROPHORETIC SEPARATION PROCESSES TO CHARACTERIZE HUMIC SUBSTANCES AND THEIR INTERACTIONS WITH POLLUTANTS

摘要

Many structural concepts on natural organic matter and humic substances have been discussed over the last decades within the scientific community, ranging from macromolecular to supramolecular models. The capillary zone electrophoretic (CZE) approach, combines studies with model compounds, simulations of the electrophoretic behaviour of polydisperse system and separations of colloidal mixtures in aqueous buffers. CZE contributes to the understanding of the structure and behaviour of these mixtures in aqueous solutions and offers additional information on the intermolecular processes of NOM (molecular rearrangements, microgel and polymeric behaviour). CE gives mainly information on the charge, conformation and charge density, important parameters when investigating their interactions with pollutants. This presentation aims to present a detailed description of the CE separation processes, in order to interpret the behaviour of humic substances in aqueous media within this analytical technique. Complementary to this article the NMR-spectroscopy approaches, presented by Hertkorn and Kettrup in the same issue gives detailed chemical structural information on the present components rather than on their behaviour in solution.