Supercritical fluid chromatography density

Supercritical Fluid Chromatography. Supercritical fluid chromatography (sfc) combines the advantages of gc and hplc in that it allows the use of gc-type detectors when supercritical fluids are used instead of the solvents normally used in hplc. Carbon dioxide, -petane, and ammonia are common supercritical fluids (qv). For example, carbon dioxide (qv) employed at 7.38 MPa (72.9 atm) and 31.3°C has a density of 448 g/mL. 

Figure 17. Enantiomer separation by supercritical fluid chromatography of 7-chloro-2,3.4,5-tetrahydro-l-methyl-5-phenyl-1,4-benzodiazepin-2(l//)-one (dihydrodiazepam) on a 2.5 m x0.05 mm (i.d.) fused silica capillary column, containing immobilized octamethylenc-Chirasil-Dex [carbon dioxide at 90CC. density programmed from 0.31 g/mL (130 atm) at 0.0029 g/mL min 1 after an initial 2.0-min period at 0.31 g/ mL]130.

The effect of temperature, pressure and density on solute retention (k1) in supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC) has been well studied.(1-6) Retention in SFC depends upon both solute solubility in the fluid and solute interaction with the stationary phase. The functional relationship between retention and pressure at constant temperature has been described by Van Wasen and Schneider. ( 1 ) The trend in retention is seen to depend on the partial molar volume of... 

In addition to conventional liquid chromatography, supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC), using a supercritical fluid as mobile phase (mostly scf-C02), has attracted attention in the last decades [58, 164, 168, 169]. Supercritical fluids provide a favourable medium for the transport of solutes through a chromatographic column because they resemble a gas in terms of viscosity, a liquid in terms of density, and are intermediate between these two phases in terms of diffusivity. For some physieal properties of supercritical solvents, see Section 3.2. 

Retention and selectivity in supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC) are a complex function of many experimental variables and are not as easily rationalized as in the case of gas and liquid chromatography. Retention in SFC is dependent on temperature, density (and pressure drop), stationary-phase composition, and the mobile-phase composition. Many of these variables are interactive and do not change in a simple or easily predicted manner [1]. 

Supercritical fluid chromatography is a very important chromatographic technique still underestimated and underutilized. It presents characteristics similar to both GC and HPLC, although having its own characteristics. Whereas the column temperature control is the way to achieve a good separation in GC and the solvating power of the mobile phase is controlling factor in HPLC, in SFC the density of the fluid is the major factor to be optimized. Both packed (LC-like) and capillary (GC-like) columns have been used in this technique, which has found applications in practically all areas in which GC or HPLC has shown to be the selected separation technique. 

As shown by the data in Table 33-1, the physical properties of a supercritical fluid can be remarkably different from the same properties in either the liquid or the gaseous state. For example, the density of a supercritical fluid is typically 200 to 400 times greater than that of the corresponding gas and approaches that of the substance in its liquid state. The properties compared in Table 33-1 are those that are of importance in gas, liquid, and supercritical-fluid chromatography. 

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