Comparison of Two Novel Techniques for Eliminating Liquid Chromatography Gradient Ghost Peaks

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Abstract
Distilled water to organic gradients in reversed phase liquid chromatography are often plagued with UV-detectable “ghost” peaks that can obscure sample peaks and complicate interpretation of results.3,4 These contaminants usually come from the distilled water3 although it is possible for them to originate in the organic eluent4. The ghost-peak problem can be eliminated by using specially prepared “LC-grade” water, although this is expensive. In addition water can be cleaned with the Milli-Q ion-exchange system, containing a carbon absorption column5 but not where these systems contain buffers or organic amine eluting agents such as triethylamine phosphate. Gurkin and Ripphahn have shown that a C-8 silica column can be used off-line in a low- pressure mode to clean water6.