

A computer screen showing the results of high-performance liquid chromatography analysis of bacteria.



Photo: High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) is a very fast and precise kind of liquid chromatography used in research labs. Here it's being used to analyze an antibiotic for controlling diseases in wheat. Photo by Jack Dykinga courtesy of US Department of Agriculture/Agricultural Research Service.


  1. What is chromatography?
  2. How does chromatography work?
  3. What are the different types of chromatography?
  4. How does gas chromatography work?
  5. What is chromatography used for?
  6. Find out more

What is chromatography?




Chromatography makes ink smudge on wet paper

Photo: What makes ink blur on wet paper? What you're seeing here is chromatography in action. Different inks and papers produce very different effects. Try experimenting for yourself!

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How does chromatography work?



Artwork explaining how chromatography works by making molecules separate at the interface between a solid and a liquid.

Artwork: How chromatography works: here the mobile phase is a liquid (blue) and the stationary phase is a solid (gray). The green molecule spends most time in the liquid so moves fastest. The yellow molecule spends more time on the surface of the solid, so moves slower. The red molecule spends even more time on the solid surface, so moves slowest.


What are the different types of chromatography?


Paper chromatography

A simple paper chromatography experiment showing how blobs of ink on paper separate into component colors when you dip the paper into water.

Photo: Simple paper chromatography. Draw some blobs of ink on paper (Crayola washable children's fiber tips are perfect), roll the paper into a cylinder, and place it in a wine glass with a small amount of water. As the water creeps up the paper, the colors will separate out into their components. That's chromatography in action!


Column chromatography

Instead of paper, the stationary phase is a vertical glass jar (the column) packed with a highly adsorbent solid, such as crystals of silica or silica gel, or a solid coated with a liquid. The mobile phase drips (or is pumped at high pressure) through the column and splits into its components, which are then removed and analyzed.

There are quite a few variations, including:

GIF animation showing how column chromatography works

Photo: Column chromatography: You take your column, containing the stationary phase, and load it with your sample at the top (dark gray). As you add eluant (solvent) to the sample, it splits into its components (let's say they are colored red, yellow, and blue). These travel at different speeds and emerge one at a time at the bottom, where you can collect them in different containers.

Gas chromatography



Photo: gas chromatography sample being injected

Photo: Gas chromatography is largely automated, but it still takes a trained operator to work one of these machines. Here, the sample is about to be injected. Photo by courtesy of NASA Kennedy Space Center (NASA-KSC).

How does gas chromatography work?


Simple artwork showing the main components of a gas chromatography machine

  5. The gases that make up the sample separate out as they move along the column (orange), which contains the stationary phase (typically, it's a thin coating on the inside wall of the column). The column is a very thin (capillary) tube, sometimes as much as 30–60m (100-200ft) long, coiled and entirely contained inside an oven (blue) that keeps it at a high enough temperature to ensure that the sample remains in gas form. The temperature of the oven can be carefully controlled.

What is chromatography used for?

... the pigments separate themselves from top to bottom in different colored zones.... such a preparation I call... the chromatographic method.

Mikhail Tswett, 1906

Chromatography was developed in Russia in 1906 by an Italian-born botanist named Mikhail Tswett (sometimes spelled Tsvet; 1872–1919), who used it for studying plant pigments such as chlorophyll. (Like all great scientists, Tswett used and built on techniques developed by earlier researchers, so there is dispute over whether he can truly be described as the "inventor" of chromatography.)


Photo: Gas chromatography of exhaust fumes.


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Woodford, Chris. (2009/2020) Chromatography. Retrieved from [Accessed (Insert date here)]

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