Eluent generation is the heart of Reagent-Free Ion Chromatography with Eluent Generation (RFIC-EG TM ) technology. When your IC automatically generates its own high-quality eluent on demand—in the exact amount and concentration needed for your application—you save time and effort while eliminating the variability that occurs with manually prepared eluents. No more measuring, mixing, and degassing. No more worrying about recipe errors or eluent contamination. You just add water and get great results. How Does Eluent Generation Technology Work? Just Add Water Dionex eluent generators use electrolysis to convert pure water into potassium hydroxide eluent for anion separations or methanesulfonic acid eluent for cation separations. The eluent's counter ion (potassium or methanesulfonate) comes from the EluGen® cartridge reservoir; it diffuses across a membrane into the cartridge's high-pressure chamber during electrolysis. The dual membrane system of the EluGen K2CO3 allows electrolytic production of carbonate eluents. A degasser built into the cartridge outlet removes by-product gas (hydrogen or oxygen) from the eluent stream. The result? A pure, contamination-free eluent is delivered on demand in the exact concentration needed for your application. With on-line eluent generation, the concentration of the eluent delivered is a function of the applied current, eluent flow rate, concentration of the species in the reservoir, and other factors—but you don't need to do any calculations yourself. Dionex eluent generators automatically determine and apply the exact current required to deliver the eluent concentration you want at the flow rate you specify. Because eluent generation is an instantaneous process, you can easily change eluent concentration dynamically during a run. Thus, you can take advantage of gradient ion chromatography and get faster, better separations, even if you only have an isocratic pump. Consider the Advantages of Eluent Generation For most IC applications, eluent generation is simply a better solution. Consider all these advantages: Significant savings in time and effort: Instead of manually preparing eluents, you simply supply your system with deionized water and proceed with your analyses. Each EluGen cartridge lasts 6–12 months under typical usage conditions, and changing a cartridge takes only a few minutes. Greatly improved reproducibility: By eliminating variability associated with manual eluent preparation, and by eliminating the possibility of eluent contamination, eluent generation delivers reproducible results, day to day, week to week, lab to lab. Better gradient performance: Electrolytically generated gradients are more precise than mechanically proportioned gradients, and have lower dispersion because dead volume is lower. Also, absorption of atmospheric carbon dioxide or ammonia is virtually eliminated, so eluent contamination is no longer a concern. You get lower background signal, reduced noise, smaller baseline shifts, and better peak resolution. Greater pump reliability: Because the only fluid in contact with the pump is deionized water, seals and pistons last much longer than they do when pumping premixed eluents.
Take Advantage of Eluent Generation in Your Laboratory Eluent generation technology is built into Dionex ICS-3000 and ICS-2000 ion chromatography systems. Many other Dionex ICs can be upgraded with eluent generation capability. For details, see "Upgrade Your Existing System to RFIC."
|
