Abstract
This review article is aimed at summarizing the various strategies that have been developed so far for post-polymerization functionalization (PPF) of organic polymer-based monoliths used in liquid phase separation techniques, namely HPLC at all scales and capillary electrochromatography (CEC). The reader will find the organic reactions performed on monolithic columns for grafting the chromatographic ligands needed for solving the separation problems on hand. This process involves therefore the fabrication of template monoliths that carry reactive functional groups to which chromatographic ligands can be covalently attached in a post-polymerization kind of approach. That is, the template monolith that has been optimized in terms of pore structure and other morphology can be readily modified and tailor made on column to fit a particular separation. The review article will not only cover the various strategies developed so far but also describe their separation applications. To the best of our knowledge, this review article will be the first of its kind.
Highlights
In principle, the simplest approach for making monolithic column involves the direct co-polymerization of functional monomers with crosslinkers in order to yield monolithic stationary phases with the desired functionalities
This method successfully detected bromate after the post reaction and showed good LOD, linearity, short analysis time of 8.5 min and reproducibility. Another application involved the separation of DNA fragments and oligonucleotides on a poly(GMA-co-ethylene dimethacrylate (EDMA)) precursor monolith prepared in a microbore column that was converted to a weak anion-exchange monolithic bearing diethyl amine ligands via post polymerization functionalization (PPF)
The proposed monolithic capillary column started with a preparation of a generic hypercrosslinked poly(4-methylstyrene-co-vinylbenzyl chlorideco-divinylbenzene) via a Friedel–Crafts reaction catalyzed with iron chloride to achieve large surface area of 430 m2 /g, see Scheme 5
Summary
The simplest approach for making monolithic column involves the direct co-polymerization of functional monomers with crosslinkers in order to yield monolithic stationary phases with the desired functionalities. As an alternative route of monolithic column preparation, post polymerization functionalization (PPF) of precursor monoliths allows the introduction of various polar and nonpolar ligands onto the monolithic surfaces starting from one generic and optimized template monolith. Various PPF procedures have been described and demonstrated in the literature to yield separation performances in different separation methods, such as capillary electrochromatography (CEC), HPLC, capillary LC and nano-LC. It is the aim of this review article to summarize the various strategies in PPF of monoliths and demonstrates. The various PPF strategies performed on the different precursor monoliths have allowed the efficient separations of different analytes using a few original monoliths as the starting columns, which helped to save time and consumable
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