Selective adsorption onto agarose gels has become a powerful method to separate single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs). A better understanding of the nature of the interactive forces and specific sites responsible for adsorption should lead to significant improvements in the selectivity and yield of these separations. A combination of nonequilibrium and equilibrium studies are conducted to explore the potential role that van der Waals, ionic, hydrophobic, pi-pi and ion-dipole interactions have on the selective adsorption between agarose and SWCNTs suspended with sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS). The results demonstrate that any modification to the agarose gel surface and, consequently, the permanent dipole moments of agarose drastically reduces the retention of SWCNTs. Because these permanent dipoles are critical to retention and the fact that SDS-SWCNTs function as macro-ions, it is proposed that ion dipole forces are the primary interaction responsible for adsorption. The selectivity of adsorption may be attributed to variations in polarizability between nanotube types, which create differences in both the structure and mobility of surfactant. These differences affect the enthalpy and entropy of adsorption, and both play an integral part in the selectivity of adsorption. The overall adsorption process shows a complex behavior that is not well represented by the Langmuir model; therefore, calorimetric data should be used to extract thermodynamic information.