Research development of designing flow cells for optical absorption detectors

Abstract

The optical absorption detector is one of the most commonly used detectors for high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). As a core part of this kind of detector, the designs of flow cells, where light passes through samples for acquiring samples information, will affect the performance of a detector. In order to enhance the signal to noise ratio of detectors and reduce the bands broadening that come from flow cells, it is necessary to design a flow cell with a longer optical path length and a less cell volume while maintaining the luminous flux. However the limitations of the machining capacity make it difficult to increase the optical path length, reduce the cell volume and keep or increase the luminous flux simultaneously. It is a challenge to optimize the designing and machining of flow cells so as to improve the performance of detectors. This review discusses the development of designing flow cells based on the detection principle in some aspects of increasing the optical path length, reducing the cell volume, taking the advantages of total reflection and so on. At the same time, some of the designs are illustrated in detail. These various ideas and structures are significant references for designing flow cells and developing optical absorption detectors.