The Main Factor of Affecting the Life of the Liquid Chromatographic Column

One of the main factors affecting the life of the liquid chromatographic column is the mobile phase. There are three aspects of the mobile phase factors.

The pH value of the Mobile Phase
The fillers of different substrates apply to different pH value range. Under normal temperature, the solubility of amorphous silica gel in pure water is about 100mg•L-1, and the dissolved amount of silica gel in the pH range of 1 to 9 is almost constant. In the consideration of the influence of dissolution rate, the most suitable pH range of the mobile phase for the silica gel substrate is 1 to 8. However, the silica gel fillers of bonded phase make the filler greatly increase the adaptability of the fillers to mobile phase because of the shielding effects. The fillers in the improper pH value will quickly reduce the column efficiency and scrap it.

The Deterioration of Mobile Phase
The most widely used filler is the silicon-based bonded phase fillers nowadays. When the mobile phase is the aqueous solution or contains a certain concentration of phosphate buffer, some bacteria breeding from the solutions will block the gap between the stationary phase particles.

The Purity of Mobile Phase
A large number of mobile phases will pass through the column when the chromatographic columns are used. In that case, if the mobile phase contains a certain amount of insoluble impurity particles, the particles will be intercepted at the head of the column easily. And the mechanical blockage of the columns caused by the particles results in an increase of column pressure, which means that the columns can not be used.

And there are still some other factors that affect the chromatographic column, such as the polarity of the mobile phase and so on.