by
Bart » Mon Nov 08, 2004 4:49 pm
Any of the ligand exchange carbohydrate analysis columns can be used for sucrose analysis. Your choice of columns depends on the complexity of your sample. The 87K column is a potassium form column which works well for a simple mixture of sugars, especially if potassium is part of the mixture. The heavier the counter metal on the polymer, the greater the degree of separation of sugars. USP L-19 is a calcium loaded column. USP L-34 is a Pb loaded column. The Pb form column will give the greatest separation of sugars, the calcium form less, and the potassium form the least. You need to review what you need to separate and match it to the best column using either selectivity charts, published methods, or consulting with the technical support group at the column manufacturer. Fermentation broths are complex mixtures which will contain both sugars and organic acids. The column of choice for these mixtures is usually the hydrogen form column (87H) which can separate both organic acids using ion-exclusion and sugars using ligand exchange. Besides Bio-Rad, there are a number of companies (Hamilton, Supelco, Metachem, Transgenomic, etc.) that make these types of columns, so if you are working through a distributor, they should carry one of these lines of columns.