Monolithic Silicas in High Performance Liquid Chromatography – the alternative to Conventional Packed-Particle Columns

Egidijus Machtejevas, Advanced Analytics, Merck, 64293 Darmstadt , Germany

In contrast to conventional packed-particle columns, monolithic silica columns are made of a single continuous-bed rod of high purity porous silica that is then bonded with C18, C8 and the other modifications that chromatographers have known and trusted to solve their separation needs through the history of HPLC. Monolithic columns remove backpressure issue as the primary consideration in method development and give back the flexibility of choices in flow rates for much higher throughput, column lengths for superior resolution, and solvent choices for optimum selectivities that smaller and smaller sized packed-particle columns have slowly taken away over the decades. Because they have no individual particles to shift or break, column performance is very consistent over much longer lifetime, making them ideal for method transfer into production QC or multiple sites. Their high permeability also makes them very forgiving of shortcuts and timesaving in sample preparation as well as easier to aggressively flush out to reequilibrate. This presentation will guide you through the world of monolithic silica materials. Benefits will be demonstrated with many application examples including pharmaceutical and bioanalysis separations (proteomics, peptidomics, etc.), calibration curves, recovery calculations, and method robustness overviews.