Properties of columns with several pyridinium and imidazolium ionic liquid stationary phases

• The work is devoted to investigate some classes of ionic liquids as a new GC phases.
• Polarity and selectivity were measured.
• The contribution of main individual interactions to retaining compounds was revealed.
• HETP dependencies and loading capacity data were obtained and analyzed.

Recent advances in the development of new liquid phases (ILs) made it possible to use some classes of ILs as polar stationary liquid phases (SLP). In our days only alkylimidazolium- and alkylphosphonium-based ILs are widely used as polar SLP. In present work some other types of ILs – pyridinium and cyanopropyl/hydroxypropyl imidazolium were investigated as SLP. Columns with efficiencies 2000–2500 plates/m by high-pressure static method were prepared. Polarity and selectivity of these phases were measured. Selectivity was described in terms of intermolecular interactions by using Abraham solvatation parameter model. The set of the regularities between cation structure of ionic liquid and selectivity has been shown. The number and position of methyl groups in ionic liquid pyridinium ring were shown to have the sufficient influence on all type of molecular interactions. Finally the resolutions of test mixture for the several ionic liquid SLP were obtained. For columns with some ionic liquids the dependencies of the height equivalent to a theoretical plate (HETP) and sample loading capacity were obtained and compared with the conventional phases. It was found that the optimal efficiency for the IL columns is attained at lower carrier gas velocities in comparison with traditional phases. Nevetheless sample loading capacity of IL phases is comparable to those of conventional GC phases.