This article reviews the basic principles of high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The introductory section provides an overview of the HPLC technique, placing it in historical context and discussing the elementary facts of the separation mechanism. The next section discusses the nature of resolution, describing the two principal aspects, zone center separation and zone spreading. The third section takes a detailed look at how HPLC is used in practice to achieve a separation. It discusses the three key variables that need to be adjusted: retention, efficiency, and selectivity. A fourth section is concerned with various relationships of practical importance: flow rate, temperature, and pressure. A final section discusses future trends in HPLC.
