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In last month's installment of "GC Connections," John Hinshaw discussed how peak retention times depend upon relationships between pressure, flow rate, oven temperature, column dimensions, and stationary phase. This concluding installment of a two-part series discusses the effects that column variability has on isothermal capillary gas chromatography and explores instrument calibration with the goal of maximizing instrument-to-instrument similarity of retention times.

The authors provide suggestions for the sample pretreatment and analysis of aerosol particles including the use of on-line SFE–LC–GC–MS, GCXGC and LC–MS. Although each technique has its merits, the novel multidimensional systems and those integrating sample pretreatment with the final analysis proved to be valuable tools in aerosol analysis.

While some variation in retention is normal, larger changes from run to run are generally indicative of a problem. Here, the auther discusses how the retention time of a peak in an LC separation can be a useful diagnostic tool to identify problems with a separation.