HPLC is a type of liquid chromatography that uses a pump to force a mobile phase through a column packed with solid particles or porous material at high pressure. This allows for high-speed and high-performance separation of mixtures into individual components. HPLC works on the principle of adsorption, where different components interact differently with the stationary phase in the column and therefore separate and elute at different rates when the mobile phase is passed through under pressure. The basic instrumentation of HPLC includes a pump, injector, column, detector, and computer.