N-, O- and P-selective on-column atomic emission detection in capillary gas chromatography

Stig Pedersen-Bjergaard*, Tyge Greibrokk

*Corresponding author for this work
    17 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    A 350-kHz He plasma sustained on-column was evaluated for N-, O- and P-selective atomic emission detection in capillary gas chromatography. As the plasma caused peak tailing when sustained in 2.0 ml/min of carrier gas, 15 ml/min of auxiliary helium was added to the discharge. For N- and O-selective detection, CH4 mixed with O2 or N2, respectively, were used as plasma dopant. Even with this extensive plasma doping, non-specific responses arose from eluting hydrocarbons due to temporary changes in the background level of atomic N and O. Without background correction, element-to-carbon selectivities for N and O were limited to 100:1 and 40:1, respectively. For both elements, detection limits at the 50 pg/s level and linearities of 5 · 102 were obtained. P-selective detection was carried out with H2-CH4 as plasma dopant, and provided a 39 pg/s detection limit for P. The phosphorus-to-carbon selectivity was 2300:1 and the linearity was 2 · 102. With background correction, both selectivities and detection limits are expected to improve significantly.

    Original languageEnglish
    JournalJournal of Chromatography A
    Volume686
    Issue number1
    Pages (from-to)109-119
    Number of pages11
    ISSN0021-9673
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 25 Nov 1994

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