Chemically bonded stationary phases

Reverse phase chromatography is finding increasing use in modern LC. For example, steroids (42) and fat soluble vitamins (43) are appropriately separated by this mode. Reverse phase with a chemically bonded stationary phase is popular because mobile phase conditions can be quickly found which produce reasonable retention. (In reverse phase LC the mobile phase is typically a water-organic solvent mixture.) Rapid solvent changeover also allows easy operation in gradient elution. Many examples of reverse phase separations can be found in the literature of the various instrument companies. 

Tswett s initial column liquid chromatography method was developed, tested, and applied in two parallel modes, liquid-solid adsorption and liquid-liquid partition. Adsorption ehromatography, based on a purely physical principle of adsorption, eonsiderably outperformed its partition counterpart with mechanically coated stationary phases to become the most important liquid chromatographic method. This remains true today in thin-layer chromatography (TLC), for which silica gel is by far the major stationary phase. In column chromatography, however, reversed-phase liquid ehromatography using chemically bonded stationary phases is the most popular method. 

Liquid-solid chromatography (LSC), sometimes referred to as normal phase or straight phase chromatography, is characterized by the use of an inorganic adsorbent or chemically bonded stationary phase with polar functional groups and a nonaqueous mobile phase... 

Locke, D. (1974) Selectivity in reversed-phase liquid chromatography using chemically bonded stationary phases. J. Chromatogr. Sci. 12, 433 137. 

The great versatility of HPLC lies in the fact that the stability of the chemically bonded stationary phases used in partition chromatography allows the use of a wide range of liquids as a mobile phase without the stationary phase being lost or destroyed. This means that there is less need for a large number of different stationary phases as is the case in gas chromatography. The mobile phase must be available in a pure form and usually requires degassing before use. The choice of mobile phase (Table 3.6) is influenced by several factors. 

Separation and quantitation of carbohydrate mixtures may be achieved using HPLC, a method that does not necessitate the formation of a volatile derivative as in GLC. Both partition and ion-exchange techniques have been used with either ultraviolet or refractive index detectors. Partition chromatography is usually performed in the reverse phase mode using a chemically bonded stationary phase and acetonitrile (80 20) in 0.1 mol U1 acetic acid as the mobile phase. Anion- and cation-exchange resins have both been used. Carbohydrates... 

Jrnno, K., Nagoshi, T., Tanaka, N., Okamoto, M., Fetzer, J.C., and Biggs, W.R., Effect of column temperature on the retention of peropyrene-type polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons on various chemically bonded stationary phases in re versed-phase liquid chromatography, J. Chromatogr., 436, 1, 1988. 

The chromatographic column used was a wall-coated, open tubular column (WCOT) (J W Scientific) with a DB-1 Durabond chemically bonded stationary phase that had a nominal film thickness of 0.25 pm. The column was 60 m long X 0.32 mm i.d. The DB-1 stationary phase has chromatographic properties similar to SE-30. 

This problem was remedied by the discovery of methods for chemically bonding the active stationary phase to the inert support. Most chemically bonded stationary phases are produced by covalent modification of the surface silica. Three modification processes are shown in Equations 3.6-3.8. 

The use of nonpolar chemically bonded stationary phases with a polar mobile phase is referred to as reverse-phase HPLC. This technique separates sample components according to hydrophobicity. It is widely used for the separation of all types of biomolecules, including peptides, nucleotides, carbohydrates, and derivatives of amino acids. Typical solvent systems are water-methanol, water-acetonitrile, and water-tetrahydrofiiran mixtures. Figure 3.15 shows the results of protein separation on a silica-based reverse-phase column. 

Affinity chromatography combines the analytical and chemical capacities of chemically bonded stationary phases and immobilized enzymes. Technology and methodology of both techniques are joined in the development of affinity stationary phases. Since steric requirements are even more determining than in simple immobilized enzyme systems, spacer molecules have great importance in these modifications. Commonly used spacer arms are summarized in figure 8.3. 

Chemically bonded phases (CBP s) are very commonly used in LC, and occasionally also in GC. Such phases cannot be seen as either a solid or a liquid. The common term [201] used for LC involving such phases is bonded phase chromatography (BPC). To be consistent, the stationary phase identification should follow that of the mobile phase in defining the chromatographic system. Hence, LBPC should be used for liquid chromatography using chemically bonded stationary phases. 

For the samples that will be subjected to other (so-called interactive) LC techniques, the next question involves the nature of the solvent in which the sample has been or can be dissolved. If this is a non-polar solvent, such as n-hexane, then the sample solution is compatible with Normal Phase LC (NPLC), in which mobile phases with a relatively low polarity are used in combination with more polar stationary phases (see section 3.2.3). In this form of chromatography solid adsorbents (such as silica or alumina) may be used as stationary phases (LSC). Alternatively, polar chemically bonded stationary phases may be used (see section 3.2.2). 

Polar chemically bonded stationary phases (section 3.2.2.2) may be used as an alternative stationary phase for both RPLC and LSC, if variations in the mobile phase do not result in an adequate separation. If polar CBPs are used in combination with more polar mobile phases (reversed phase mode), then table 3.10c may be used to find the most appropriate optimization parameters. If operated in the normal phase mode, table 3.1 Od... 

The columns used for the GC separation of phytosterols are currently almost exclusively capillary columns with 0.1-0.3 mm internal diameter, and fused-silica capillary columns with chemically bonded stationary phases are commonly used (Abidi, 2001). The best separation of structurally very similar sterols, such as sitosterol and its saturated counterpart sitostanol, is obtained with slightly polar stationary phases like 5% diphenyl-95% dimethylpolysiloxane, and they are currently the most used columns for the separation of phytosterols (Lagarda et al., 2006). For detailed lists of different columns used in sterol analysis, see the papers by Abidi (2001) and Lagarda (2006). 

We now have a fairly adequate understanding of the different properties, including the particle diameter i/p, the pore size, the degree of permeability, and the chemical composition of the surface of the support matrix, to know which type of stationary phase can be successfully used with a particular class of peptides. Most of the HPLC packing materials now in use for peptide separations are based on the wide pore microparticulate silica gels with polar or nonpolar carbonaceous phases chemically bonded to the surface of the matrix. Methods for the preparation of these chemically bonded stationary phases, their available sources of supply. 

There are several basic rules for the preparation of chemically bonded stationary phases. 

The chemically bonded stationary phase has to show thermal and solvent stability. It is the reason why the stationary phases containing Si-O-C bonds are used when anhydrous conditions exist. Otherwise a Si-C bond is produced which is stable at the generally more used chromatographic conditions used. 

In order to improve the separation efficiency and speed in biopolymer analysis a variety of new packing materials have been developed. These developments aim at reducing the effect of slow diffusion between mobile and stationary phase, which is important in the analysis of macromolecules due to their slow diffusion properties. Perfusion phases [13] are produced from highly cross-linked styrene-divinylbenzene copolymers with two types of pores through-pores with a diameter of 600-800 mu and diffusion pores of 80-150 nm. Both the internal and the external surface is covered with the chemically bonded stationary phase. The improved efficiency and separation speed result from the fact that the biopolymers do not have to enter the particles by diffusion only, but are transported into the through-pores by mobile-phase flow. 

The development of chemically bonded stationary phases is one of the major factors that lead to the growth of high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and is responsible for its importance as a separation technique. 

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