Study of the Interactions of Ionic Liquids in IC by QSRR.

The nature of ionic liquids (ILs) facilitates their analysis by ion chromatography which, unlike conventional high-performance liquid chromatography, enables analysis both of cations and anions. This paper describes a pioneering ion-chromatographic investigation of IL cations and statistical evaluation of quantitative structure-retention relationships with the objective of predicting the molecular mechanism responsible for retention. Eleven ionic liquid imidazolium and pyridinium cations were analyzed on a CS15 cation-exchange column by isocratic elution with acetonitrile-methanesulfonic acid mixtures. Structural descriptors of the cations obtained from molecular modeling were used to describe their hydrophobicity as determined by chromatography. The most statistically significant were three-term QSRR regression equations relating log k(w) to analyte n-octanol-water partition coefficient (log P), dipole moment (µ), solvent accessible surface area (A(SAS)), and hydration energy (HE). They indicate the important role of both hydrophobic and polar the retention of ILs on the CS15 column.

Chromatographic behaviour of ionic liquid cations in view of quantitative structure-retention relationship.

The availability of ionic liquids (ILs) in wide areas of application often results in the requirement on their determination. The attention is also often focused on the knowledge of hydrophobicity as it plays a key role in the biological effects, in the assessment of environmental risk and in the prediction of the fate of chemicals in the environment and of its influence on retention in RP HPLC. One can get information regarding hydrophobicity and retention mechanism if quantitative structure-retention relationships (QSRRs) are identified. The QSRRs were derived for logarithms of retention factors extrapolated to a pure water (or aqueous buffer) eluent, log k(w), determined for the pyridinium and imidazolium ionic liquid (IL) cations on two C8 (Supelcosil LC-8-DB, Symmetry C8) and two C18 (ACE 5 C18, Symmetry C18) stationary phases with isocratic elution by a mobile phase consisting of acetonitrile/40 mM phosphate buffer. The analyses of ILs were performed at a flow rate of 1 mL min(-1) with UV detection at 218 nm. The QSRRs were derived based on the retention parameters determined experimentally and the structural descriptors of test analytes from molecular modeling. Separations of ILs were obtained with aqueous acetonitrile buffered at pH 3.55 mobile phases. The statistically most significant two-parameter QSRR regression equations related log k(w) to the solvent accessible surface (SAS) of the analytes and the differences in the energies of the highest occupied and the lowest unoccupied molecular orbitals (diffHL). These equations were especially good in case of columns with the highest carbon loads and larger specific surface areas, i.e. Symmetry C18 and Symmetry C8. On the other hand, the column ACE 5 C18 appeared to produce the best quality separations of the ILs studied. The QSRRs derived in the research shed light on the molecular mechanism of HPLC separation of ILs and helped to predict their relative separations.

Characterization of the properties of stationary phases for liquid chromatography in aqueous mobile phases using aromatic sulphonic acids as the test compounds.

We investigated the effects of the concentration of naphthalene sulphonic acids (NSAs) as anionic test compounds in the injected sample and of the salt additives to the mobile phase on ion-exclusion. The retention behaviour of NSAs sensitively reflects even minor changes in the ionic and hydrophobic interactions and can be useful for predicting the effects of the stationary phases in reversed-phase chromatography of polar and ionic compounds, both small ones and biopolymers, e.g., oligonucleotides. We studied chromatographic properties of several stationary phases intended for separations in aqueous mobile phases: a C18 column end-capped with polar hydrophilic groups, a densely bonded C8 column doubly end-capped with short alkyl groups, a short alkyl stationary phase designed to keep full pore accessibility in highly-aqueous mobile phases and a Bidentate column with "bridged" C18 groups attached to the silica hydride support. The chemistry and pore structure of various types of column packing materials and of the salt additives to the mobile phase affect the proportion of the pore volume non-accessible to anions due to ion-exclusion and consequently the peak asymmetry and hydrophobic selectivity in reversed-phase chromatography of organic acids. We also addressed the problems connected with the determination of column hold-up volume in aqueous mobile phases. The accessibility of the stationary phase for anionic compounds in contact with the sample zone is affected by ion-exclusion due to repulsive interactions with the negatively charged surface in the pores of the stationary phase. The accessible part of the stationary phase increases and consequently the migration velocity along the column decreases with increasing concentration of the sample in the zone moving along the column. Because of a limited access to the stationary phase, its capacity can be easily overloaded. The combination of the column overload and ion-exclusion effects may result in fronting or tailing peak asymmetry. To explain this behaviour, we proposed a modified Langmuir model, respecting the variation of the column capacity due to the effects of sample concentration on ion-exclusion.