APPLICATION OF THE NEEDLE ALGORITHM FOR EXPLORATORY ANALYSIS AND RESOLUTION OF HPLC-DAD DATA

The needle algorithm, based on a uniqueness test in target factor anal ysis, has been applied to several HPLC-DAD simulated data sets in both chromatographic and spectral directions. Information regarding the nu mber of analytes in the system, the presence of minor compounds, the l ocation of peak maxima and eventually some characteristics of the spec tral shapes have been obtained. The location of peak maxima has also b een used as a starting point to build a new kind of initial estimates to be input in iterative curve resolution methods, such as ALS (altern ating least squares). The resolution results have been compared with t he ones computed using initial estimations based on evolving factor an alysis.