Acetone in UPLC-MS

RobMac

<p>I understand that most LC systems have seals of polyethylene or PTFE, and acetone has limited compatibility with at least polyethylene. Can someone let me know the composition of regular Acquity UPLC seals, and if this could be problematic in the context of regular use of high (>60%) %acetone in the mobile phase?</p><p>Thanks</p><p>Rob</p>

lizh

Hello

I am sorry this took a while to get a reply to you. The material that we use is a compoite, but to answer the compatibility question more directly I contacted  the chemist that originally evaluated the amide ACQUITY column chemistry. For any concerns with compatibility we would usually recommend the THF/Hexane kit, which uses gold amongst other materials for improved robustness.

During the Waters' evaluations of the BEH Amide columns we did use the ACQUITY extensively with acetone (up to ~80%) and at high temperatures (up to 90 degrees C), without the Hexane/THF upgrade kit and experienced no problems.

If you are concerned the Hexane/THF kit would be more critical if your sample diluents are in normal phase solvents uch as Hexane/THF (or acetone), because there are more components inside the sample manager that would not be compatible with acetone. Therefore during the evaluation only ACN/Water as our sample diluents were used, the same samples as for all the other HILIC evaluations.

The other system component to mention with respect to compatibility issues was the waste tubing from the instrument to the waste can. But since the evaluationused ELSD, there were not significant quantities of waste going into the waste through this tubing, so again, we experienced no problems.

So if you follow these guidelines you should be able to run the analysis without modifications to the system.

I hope this helps. Please let me know if I can answer any additional questions.

Best regards,

Liz

RobMac

Thank you Liz, much appreciated.