Polymethacrylate monolithic columns for capillary liquid chromatography

Abstract

In recent years, continuous separation media have attracted considerable attention because of the advantages they offer over packed columns. This research resulted in two useful monolithic material types, the first based on modified silica gel and the second on organic polymers. This work attempts to review advances in the development, characterization, and applications of monolithic columns based on synthetic polymers in capillary chromatography, with the main focus on monolithic beds prepared from methacrylate-ester based monomers. The polymerization conditions used in the production of polymethacrylate monolithic capillary columns are surveyed, with attention being paid to the concentrations of monomers, porogen solvents, and polymerization initiators as the system variables used to control the porous and hydrodynamic properties of the monolithic media. The simplicity of their preparation as well as the possibilities of controlling of their porous properties and surface chemistries are the main benefits of the polymer monolithic capillary columns in comparison to capillary columns packed with particulate materials. The application areas considered in this review concern mainly separations in reversed-phase chromatography, ion-exchange chromatography, hydrophobic and hydrophilic interaction modes; enzyme immobilization and sample preparation in the capillary chromatography format are also addressed.

Monoliths with immobilized zirconium ions for selective enrichment of phosphopeptides

“…Organic polymer-based monolithic column prepared by in situ polymerization has been developing rapidly over the last two decades [23][24][25][26]. The advantages, including flexible synthesis, adjustable porosity, fast mass transport, variety of surface chemistry, pH stability and biocompatibility, make monolith an ideal alternative medium to the traditional silica stationary phases in microscale bio-analysis [24].…”

“…The advantages, including flexible synthesis, adjustable porosity, fast mass transport, variety of surface chemistry, pH stability and biocompatibility, make monolith an ideal alternative medium to the traditional silica stationary phases in microscale bio-analysis [24]. Monolithic materials also show superiority as the supports of affinity chromatography, including IMAC adsorbents.…”

Preparation and characterization of poly-(methacrylatoethyl trimethylammonium chloride-co-vinylbenzyl chloride-co-ethylene dimethacrylate) monolith

“…Each variation of the polymerization condition has significant effect on the structure of monolith. In fact, minor changes in the composition of the polymer mixture can affect the performance of monolithic column [23,35]. Hence, it is important to obtain the optimized polymerization condition.…”

“…In terms of system miniaturization and analysis, the utilization of capillary-scale monolithic column with inner diameters of 75-250 µm is more appropriate [20][21][22][23][24][25][26]. It may be related to the fact that such capillary-scale columns are well-suited to the needs of research in the field of life-sciences, where the amount of sample available is limited.…”

Recent advances in monolithic columns for protein and peptide separation by capillary liquid chromatography

“…Polymer monoliths are widely used as stationary phases, with advantages of facile preparation by polymerization of monomers in a porogenic solvent, high chemical stability over a wide pH range, and ease of modification with various functional groups [12][13][14][15]. However, low surface area and binding capacity, swelling and shrinkage in some solvents, and deficiency in mechanical stability are the main drawbacks.…”