Sodium 1-nonanesulfonate is used as a ion-pair reagent used for the separation of histidines by using the HPLC technique. It is used to study the relationship between circulating lipoprotein phospholipase A2 levels and coronary plaque volume. It is used in the study of assessing the use of the p-hydroxybenzoic acid as an indirect UV detection buffer in capillary zone electrophoresis (CZE).