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The chromatographic mobile phase carries solutes through the apparatus. In liquid chromatography it is a liquid solvent or chemical solution.

The eluent is the supplied chromatographic mobile phase. Its composition can alter both solute solubility and competition for adsorption sites, so changing the eluent can change retention even with the same chromatographic stationary phase.

Chromatography separates components of a mixture through different migration rates in contact with a chromatographic stationary phase while a chromatographic mobile phase transports them. Liquid chromatography describes the physical state of the transporting phase; size-exclusion chromatography describes a separation mechanism. Classification by phase and classification by mechanism answer different questions. In ideal size-exclusion chromatography, differential access to liquid-filled pores replaces binding as the source of differential migration.

In many other forms of chromatography, a solute repeatedly leaves the chromatographic mobile phase and returns to it. Reversible adsorption holds it at a surface; partition distributes it between the chromatographic mobile phase and an immobilized liquid chromatographic stationary phase. Spending more time stationary means less progress with the moving fluid. Two initially overlapping components can therefore emerge as separate bands without either being permanently trapped. Chromatography is useful both for comparing a sample with reference substances and for collecting separated components; a visible band need not contain just one substance.

Relative retention belongs to the sample together with the chosen chromatographic stationary phase, chromatographic mobile phase, eluent composition, and temperature. Changing these conditions can change the separation order. Chemical polarity helps explain interactions in some systems but is not a universal ranking rule. In thin-layer chromatography, a spot's TLC retardation factor is consequently conditional evidence about identity, rather than a fixed identifier intrinsic to a molecule.

A detector that measures changes of refractive index between a flowing sample and a reference stream.