High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) is the method of choice for separating non-volatile, thermally unstable, and/or polar components in a mixture. Solid and liquid samples are dissolved in an appropriate solvent and injected into a liquid chromatograph. The components in the mixture are separated by selective retention within the stationary phase. As the analytes flow through the detector of choice, there is a deflection on the chart. The area underneath the curve is proportional to the concentration of the analyte in solution. Both small molecules and polymeric species are qualitatively and quantitatively characterized utilizing HPLC. The accuracy of the determination, depending on chemical species and resolution, approaches +/- 2% with a similar precision. The mechanisms of separation include reverse phase, normal phase, ion pair, ion exchange, and size exclusion chromatography. Available detectors include ultraviolet, refractive index, mass-spectrometry, fluorescence, electrochemical, infrared, photoconductive, and conductance.

Examples

• Polymer additive analysis.
• Polymer formulation.
• Color body identification.
• Pharmaceutical and agricultural product assay.
• Reaction monitoring.
• Trace analysis of impurities in solid or liquid matrix.
• Production recycle stream monitoring.
• Chemical intermediate isolation and quantification.