FAST CAPILLARY GAS-CHROMATOGRAPHY - COMPARISON OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES

Savings in analysis time in capillary GC have always been an important issue for chromatographers since the introduction of capillary column s by Golay in 1958. In laboratories where gas chromatographic techniqu es are routinely applied as an analytical technique, every reduction o f analysis time, without significant loss of resolution, can be transl ated into a higher sample throughput and hence reduce the laboratory o perating costs. In this contribution, three different approaches for o btaining fast GC separations are investigated. First, a narrow-bore co lumn is used under conventional GC operating conditions. Secondly, the same narrow-bore column is used under typical fast GC conditions. Her e, a high oven temperature programming rate is used. The third approac h uses a recent new development in GC instrumentation: Flash-2D-GC. He re the column is placed inside a metal tube, which is resistively heat ed. With this system, a temperature programming rate of 100 degrees/s is possible. The results obtained with each of these three approaches are compared with results obtained on a column with conventional dimen sions. This comparison takes retention times as well as plate numbers and resolution into consideration.