SummaryThe potential of capillary electrophoresis for the indirect determination of anhydrides was demonstrated by the analysis of five closely-related anhydrides as their corresponding acids. Direct analysis of such substances is generally difficult because of their susceptibility to hydrolysis. In this work anhydrides were first hydrolyzed in water, hydrolysis being monitored using micellar electrokinetic chromatography (MEKC) which separated neutral anhydrides and anions of corresponding acids. After hydrolysis, separation of the acids was quickly achieved within two minutes by reversed electroosmotic-flow, capillary electrophoresis (REF-CE), with UV detection at 210 nm.hydrides are also present as pollutants in the workplace [9]. Direct determination of anhydrides is often difficult owing to their susceptibility to hydrolysis. Most published procedures for direct measurements use spectrophotometric techniques, e.g. IR and NMR spectrometry [10,11] to monitor functional groups. Direct normalphase and reverse-phase HPLC methods for the determination of some anhydrides were also reported recently [12,13]. Indirect techniques such as titration, spectrophotometry, gas chromatography and liquid chromatography involve hydrolysis and derivatization [14, 151 . The main purpose of the present study was to explore the applicability of capillary electrophoresis for fast, indirect determination of anhydrides. Five anhydrides with low molecular masses were chosen as models. Several of these anhydrides (maleic, citraconic and dimethylmaleic anhydrides) have previously been identified as environmental pollutants in water [16]. Though labile neutral anhydrides are not amenable to direct CE determination, most of them can be quantitatively hydrolyzed into stable charged acids which are good candidates for subsequent direct analysis. Therefore, anhydrides may be indirectly determined as their corresponding acids using CE.