M. Elomaa et al., APPLICATION OF EVOLVING FACTOR-ANALYSIS IN THERMOCHROMATOGRAPHY, Chemometrics and intelligent laboratory systems, 30(1), 1995, pp. 129-132
Thermochromatography (ThGC) is a temperature-resolved, multiple-inject
ion, gas chromatography technique useful in the study of pyrolysis. Co
nsecutive chromatograms are collected during pyrolysis each at known t
emperatures and representing the head-space gas component distribution
above the pyrolyzing material. Previous work with the ThGC has been l
imited entirely to the production of response surfaces of retention/te
mperature/FID response. Reported here are experiments where evolving f
actor analysis (EFA) is applied to ThGC data structures. The EFA is us
ed to resolve overlapping chromatograms based on their different origi
n in pyrolysis temperature. Simply, EFA deconvoluted the components of
the pyrolysis process as differing thermal reactions leading to diffe
rent product profiles. As a result, one gets sets of different chromat
ograms and their corresponding temperature profiles in the evolving he
ad-space gases. A specific example of analysis of the pyrolysis of an
ethylene-propylene-diene rubber is given.