Narrow-bore wall-coated open-tubular columns for fast high-resolution gas chromatographic separations of toxicants of environmental concern

Abstract

High-resolution gas chromatographic columns with 100 μm I.D. can achieve better separations than presently used 250-μm I.D. wall-coated open-tubular (WCOT) columns in about half the total time. However, these columns also produce narrower solute peaks that require low dead volume gas chromatographic systems. This paper describes a new technique for static coating of such columns and their adoption for cold on-column injections and interfacing with mass spectrometer and electron-capture detectors. They can be used with present gas chromatographic equipment, usually without any system modifications. A number of questions relating to the use of these new columns were examined experimentally. The results show no compromise in GC performance. A number of applications of narrow bore WCOT columns are presented, including comparisons of separations with corresponding 250 or 320-μm I.D. columns. It is shown that many difficult environmental separations can be resolved using narrow bore WCOT columns.