How does the solvent effect chromatography?
1 Answer
Sep 26, 2014
Chromatography is a technique used to separate the components of a mixture. Different solvents will dissolve different substances.
A polar solvent (water) will dissolve polar substances (water soluble ink in the video below).
A non-polar solvent will dissolve non-polar substances. Not in the video, but if you want to do chromatography with ink from a permanent marker you would need to use a different solvent (an alcohol could work).
Here is a video which shows a paper chromatography experiment which was conducted to separate the pigments found in a black overhead marker.
video from: Noel Pauller
Hope this helps...
Noel P.
