Versatile, sensitive liquid chromatography mass spectrometry – Implementation of 10 μm OT columns suitable for small molecules, peptides and proteins

AbstractWe have designed a versatile and sensitive liquid chromatographic (LC) system, featuring a monolithic trap column and a very narrow (10 μm ID) fused silica open tubular liquid chromatography (OTLC) separation column functionalized with C18-groups, for separating a wide range of molecules (from small metabolites to intact proteins). Compared to today’s capillary/nanoLC approaches, our system provides significantly enhanced sensitivity (up to several orders) with matching or improved separation efficiency, and highly repeatable chromatographic performance. The chemical properties of the trap column and the analytical column were fine-tuned to obtain practical sample loading capacities…