ABSTRACT
Knowing the adsorption isotherms of the components of a mixture on the chromatographic system used to separate them is necessary for a better understanding of the separation process and for the optimization of the production rate and costs in preparative high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). Currently, adsorption isotherms are usually measured by frontal analysis, using conventional analytical columns. Unfortunately, this approach requires relatively large quantities of pure compounds, and hence is expensive, especially in the case of pure enantiomers. In this work, we investigated the possible use of packed micro-bore and capillary HPLC columns for the determination of adsorption isotherms of benzophenone, o-cresol and phenol in reversed-phase systems and of the enantiomers of mandelic acid on a Teicoplanin chiral stationary phase. We found a reasonable agreement between the isotherm coefficients of the model compounds determined on micro-columns and on conventional analytical columns packed with the same material. Both frontal analysis and perturbation techniques could be used for this determination. The consumption of pure compounds needed to determine the isotherms decreases proportionally to the second power of the decrease in the column inner diameter, i.e. 10 times for a micro-bore column (1 mm I.D.) and 100 times for capillary columns (0.32 mm I.D.) with respect to 3.3 mm I.D. conventional columns.
Subject(s)
Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid/instrumentation , Adsorption , Spectrophotometry, Ultraviolet , ThermodynamicsABSTRACT
Silicone oil samples were characterized by supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC), matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI--TOF MS), and their off-line combination. SFC was used to separate samples of silicone oils on micropacked capillary columns. The fractions for the identification studies were obtained from SFC runs at defined time intervals, when the restrictor was pulled out from the chromatographic flame ionization detector (FID) and inserted into a glass vial with acetone. MALDI--TOF MS was used for the identification of individual oligomers in the fractions separated. The molecular mass distributions determined based on SFC and MALDI--TOF MS measurements were compared. From this comparison, it follows that the results are in good agreement. However, certain differences were observed: MALDI--TOF MS was capable of detecting somewhat larger oligomers than the SFC-FID, but the lower molecular mass oligomers were not present in the MALDI spectra. Differences in the region of lower molecular masses can be explained by evaporation of the more volatile low molecular mass oligomers resulting from heating of the sample during the MALDI--TOF MS measurements as a result of the absorption of the laser shot energy. The fact that no high mass discrimination effects of the MALDI--TOF MS measurements, compared with SFC, were observed is very promising for further applications of MALDI--TOF MS in characterizing synthetic polymers of moderate polydispersity.
ABSTRACT
Aromatic sulphonic acids are important dye intermediates and the determination of the individual isomers after their preparation by sulphonation of the parent aromatic hydrocarbon is important for the monitoring of the dye production process. For this purpose, either reversed-phase chromatography with mobile phases containing strong electrolytes as additives or capillary zone electrophoresis with working electrolytes containing cyclodextrins can be used to separate and determine not only individual sulphonation products with various numbers of sulphonic groups, but also various isomeric di- and trisulphonic acids. However, the separation of some isomers using either of the two techniques is not fully satisfactory. In the present work, HPLC with mobile phases containing cyclodextrins was employed to improve previously achieved separations of aromatic sulphonic acids. Because of the high cost of cyclodextrin, microcolumn HPLC with diode-array detection on the columns prepared in laboratory by supercritical fluid packing technique was employed for this purpose. Capillary columns packed with various octadecyl silica gel materials were compared and their stability and efficiency were found suitable for the separation of the compounds tested. The selectivity of separation of some isomers improved significantly with respect to the previous methods. Procedures were designed for separation and analytical control of technological processes producing dye intermediates.