how did you get into chromatography?

[MassSpecM]

hi all

i'm a little bored (waiting for HPLC method development run - 60 min)


I thought it would be interesting to know how some of you came into the wonderful world of Chromatography (mass spec)!

well, here's my story....

honours' year - project required LC/MS of oxidative stress markers.
unfortunaly university was doing so much contract work at the time, that I wasn't allowed to work on the instument at all. (only gave my samples to the technician who ran them for me)

one day we were cleaning out a store in the basement of the building, when I discovered a HPLC (don't remember the make) standing there gathering dust. Connected it up in a corner of one of the labs, and after a lot of swearing, kicking and coffee, it sprang into life! I ran all my samples on it.....gave beautifull results....ended up only reporting these results for honours project!

needless to say, I fell in love with HPLC and teh rest is history!

looking forward to reading your stories....

[Bruce Hamilton]

Excluding TLCs and Ion-exchange as first chromaography...

In 1970s used a long, narrow glass, air-pressurised column for FIA ( Fluorescent Indicator Adsorption ) of hydrocarbon types in fuels using silica. Assay into saturates, olefins, aromatics, and took about 4 hours to run , and about an hour to empty for reuse using a 2m long hypodermic needle blasting mains pressure water -lots of broken columns.

Then purchased a Pye 104 GC with chart recorder, followed by a HP 3380s integrator ( no data storage - if parameter wrong, had to reanalyse ). Mainly glass columns, but some stainless - all stationary phases prepared and packed. Used for fuel and lipid research.

Replaced with HP 5830 GC/integrator using a long glass capillary column, then 5790GC/3388, 5880, and 5890 ( finally HP 3365 software runing on Windows /386 ) - all using fused silica, stainless and glass packed columns. All used for fuiel research - biodiesel, Gas-to-gasoline, hydrogenation of coals, etc etc.

First HPLC was an ACS ( UK ) system with Cecil detectors ( UV spectrophotometer with flowcell ) and chart recorder - used for vitamins, then in early 1980s Waters 6000A solvent delivery system with U6K injector, and 440 fixed wavelength UV detector ( still have these ) used with chart recorder, then 3388, then 3390s - used for fuels, lipids, food research.

Please keep having fun,

Bruce Hamilton

[TimB]

I have only been in the industry for about 3 years, but I guess my love for Chromatography goes back to my Instrumental Analysis classes in college.

My professor was given a bunch of old Shimadzu LC parts, and we had enough to attempt to build a functional LC out of it. To make a long story short we spent a good deal of time with it, but were never able to get it working. Fun little project for me and two others to learn the basics of LC.

The next semester we were working on Independent projects. Someone had claimed the HPLC, and I really didn't want to deal with it anyways since it was an old HP Integral 4000 that we could only make manual injections on, so I chose GC. We had recently gotten an almost new Agilent 6890 donated to us. Again, my professor asked if I would get it set up as a part of my project. I did and I fell in love with GC. When I first got into industry though, I worked for a raw material supplier and really didn't do any chromatography.

It wasn't until about my second temporary position at a large pharma company, that I really got back into chromatography. This was my first exposure to Agilent/Waters/Millennium/chemstation, and everyone I worked with really helped me get a grasp on LC and developing methods. I developed my first LC-MS method, (well not really officially), for solving a "2 peaks one standard" problem and I was hooked.

[skunked_once]

My first job was in a pesticide analysis lab and I started on a 5-foot tall, floor model Barber-Coleman gas chromatograph which dated from the 60's. In 1973 we got a brand spanking new Tracor 222 floor model GC with four column inlets. Both instruments used U-shaped glass columns which we packed ourselves. We also used strip chart recorders and enjoyed the fun of ink reservoirs, peak measurement by ruler, etc.

My first experience with HPLC was a simple herbicide analysis using the good old Waters 6K pumps with their frustrating multiple check valves and the ever-leaking Waters U6K injector. I thought I'd never like HPLC but later came to love it when more user-friendly (Beckman) instruments became available to me.

Mention of certain brands reflects my personal preferences only and is not an endorsement or rejection of current chromatography equipment. That would encompass a whole separate rant

[tom jupille]

As an undergraduate in the late 60's, got a part-time job as a lab assistant (running melting points and IR's) at Regis Chemical Company (now Regis Technologies). They made and sold silylation reagents, and Lew Fox showed me how to run the GC (floor model, 6-foot, glass U-columns). I was hooked.

[DR]

I'd say something about how old *some* of us are, but I've been in it long enough to have used a Bendix GC and LAS for data acquisition (new guy getting feet wet on the old equipment).

I fell into it as it applied to biological research I was doing right out of college, learned more about it, liked it, and have had jobs involving it ever since.

[juddc]

In 1990 I was working at a small start-up who needed to expand analytical capabilities, so they bought a Waters component system (600e, 715, 991) new and told me to figure it out. Quickly. So I did...

[JGK]

While doing a BSc in Biochemistry where the third year was spent working (in industry or at a research Lab), I worked in the Drug Metabolism Dept. at Wellcome Research. Here I processed samples for analysis and as my abilities improved helped out a senior scientist perform method development for the analysis of drugs in biological fluids. I was exposed to HPLC, GC, radiochemical work and a wider variety of lab techniques.

After graduation when I started work at a CRO my previous experience in HPLC and GC "channeled" my career towards analytical chemistry. The comany put me through an MSc in Analytical Chemistry and the rest is history.

[sam.pedraglio]

I started to work as service engineer for MS instrument in Bruker and, a part of my work was install/maintain LC-ion trap.
These were my first steps in lc world (at the university I studied it just in theory).
Now I'm working in the analytical lab of a C.R.O. company as responsible for a maldi-toftof and a lc-ion-trap, while I'm working on lc-qqq instrument too.

Nice path from the instruments constitution to the pharmaceutical research.

[Camisotro]

I found analytical chemistry in general quite interesting in undergrad. In grad school I started working for a mass spectrometry research group and they subsequently started a collaboration that called for LC/MS. I borrowed LC equipment from my collaborators, soldered together the contact closure cables required to get everything talking, and basically started teaching myself what I could learn about chromatography without any actual experts around.

It's quite frustrating working with equipment that's not really designed to work together, I will admit. But I think this is good experience that will help put things into perspective if I end up doing LC/MS as a career.

[Bob Albrecht]

Working as a lab tech while in college I was running a GC and LC. Bored with routine work did some method development both for sample prep and LC/GC methods.

After college I worked for Waters developing data system software, then I worked with LC Resources writing DryLab, and while I was there I created this forum. It started as a collaboration with LC/GC. Tom Jupille now runs the forum and LC Resources.

Good job Tom!

[Bob Albrecht]

Then I got into Prep systems at Biotage

[Bob Albrecht]

Now I am working with NMR Automation systems at Protasis.

[willnatalie]

I started my grad work as a synthetic chemist at a small college. Got yelled at several times by my professor for things I was not part of but still held responsibility. Another professor called me to his office (an analytical Chemist), told me I do not need to be treated that way, and said I should work for him.
Needless to say I switched, was given a new LC/ESI/MSMS out of the box, and was told to get it running and build a method. I fell in love and now do it full time. (though everything I work with now is GC related).

[scottythree]

Grad school 1990 something... I had two not so nice running Varian LC's from the 70's. The chips were literally rusting on the computer boards! I got to know these LC's inside and out. I fell in love with the instrumentation first and learned to love determining the end results once I actually got peaks!