Chromatography Forum

I have a question what is definition of 'carbon load' of column in Chromatography. Thanx a lot.

Alleyoop

In general the carbon load is a measure of the amount of bonded phase bound to the surface of the packing.
High carbon load provides for a better colunm capacity and resolution for the major bulk of the aplications (i have read in some articles related to protein separation that it is not always the case for that group). low carbon loads gives you generally less retentive packing and faster analyses times (but lower resolution in most cases).

Be careful, though. Carbon load is an incomplete characterization, because it doesnt' take into account the pore size/surface area of the silica. A wide-pore/low surface area silica with a "low" carbon load can provide better results than a small-pore/high surface area material with a "high" carbon load. A better measure (if you can get it!) is the surface coverage in micromoles/m^2.