Question

Which separation technique will you apply for the separation of the following mixture?

Different pigments from an extract of flower petal.

Answer 1

The separation technique applied for the separation of different pigments from an extract of flower petal is chromatography.

Chromatography: The technique of separation and purification of the different coloured components of a mixture due to the difference in their extent of solubility in the solvent used for chromatography.

• Chroma or Kroma in Greek means colour.
• As this method was first used in the separation of the colours, it was named as chromatography.

Principle used in this technique is that the components to be separated are soluble in the same solvent but at different rates.

• The number of coloured spots obtained in the process of chromatography corresponds to the number of the components in the mixture.