Fundamental Properties of Packing Materials for Liquid Chromatography

The high performance of chemically-modified silica gel packing materials is based on the utilization of pure silica gels. Earlier silica gels used to be made from inorganic silica; however, nowadays, silica gels are made from organic silanes. The surface smoothness and lack of trace metals of new silica gels permits easy surface modifications (chemical reactions) and improves the reproducibility and stability. Sharpening peak symmetry is based on developing better surface modification methods (silylation). Typical examples can be found in the chromatography of amitriptyline for silanol testing and that of quinizarin for trace metal testing. These test compounds were selected and demonstrated sensitive results in the measurement of trace amounts of either silanol or trace metals. Here, we demonstrate the three-dimensional model chemical structures of bonded-phase silica gels with surface electron density for easy understanding of the molecular interaction sites with analytes. Furthermore, a quantitative explanation of hydrophilic and hydrophobic liquid chromatographies was provided. The synthesis methods of superficially porous silica gels and their modified products were introduced.