Chromatography Forum

I have recently heard about a product from Thermo Scientific called 'TurboFlow'.

Apparently it is supposed to let proteins pass through unretained - largely by virtue of the fact that they don't interact with the pores, due to the turbulent flow that is generated in the column.

It seems like a clever idea. Has anyone tried these columns to evaluate how well they actually work. We are currently considering this vs the RAM columns to help us deal with protein containing fluids.

Thanks in advance.

The idea is as old as solid-phase extraction, and it has nothing to do with turbulence.

If you flow fast enough through a packing, some analytes won't have enough time to reach the surface of the packing. The higher the molecular weight of the analyte, the slower is the diffusion. Proteins diffuse 10 to 50 times slower than small molecules. If you set up your flow rate or velocity, and particle size and column length, i.e. the residence time, correctly, proteins won't have time to reach the surface, while small molecules do and get adsorbed.