New Immobilized Lux(R) i-Cellulose-5 Columns Add Enantioselectivity and Solvent Robustness

TORRANCE, CA--(Marketwired - September 20, 2016) - Lux chiral columns offer a wide and complementary range of enantioselectivity for even the most difficult chiral separation projects under normal phase, reversed phase, polar organic, or SFC separation modes. Now, the addition of a seventh Lux CSP (i-Cellulose-5) helps to provide even greater chiral separation success along with some other very useful advantages.

When comparing all seven Lux chiral stationary phases, valuable differences can be found with the various polysaccharide supports and chiral selectors that are used. Specifically for the new i-Cellulose-5, the dichlorophenyl-moiety portion of its selector creates a novel chiral selectivity by way of having two strong electron accepting atoms that draw the electron cloud of the phenyl ring outward. This interaction mechanism combines extremely well with the existing polar, hydrogen bonding, hydrophobic, van der Waals, and other retention mechanisms to promote better enantiomeric separations as well as to complement the other six chlorinated and non-chlorinated Lux CSPs.

The Lux i-Cellulose-5 was developed and released on two different particle sizes of silica (3µm and 5µm) to aid customers with a variety of different instrumentation and needs. This allows for high efficiency analytical separations on 3µm columns to seamlessly scale to much larger 5µm Axia™ packed preparative columns for either LC or SFC. Additionally, high quality manufacturing and column packing processes were developed and implemented for the i-Cellulose-5 media to ensure batch-to-batch and column-to-column reproducibility.

Unlike other chiral columns on the market, a very distinctive feature can be found in the chemical framework of the new Lux i-Cellulose-5. During the manufacture of this new chiral product a chemical cross-linking (referred to as immobilization) between the cellulose and silica supports is created. This in turn provides incredibly strong solvent (THF, DCM, MtBE, Ethyl Acetate, etc.) robustness and prevents the phase from being dissolved in strong solvents. While not a typical method, this robustness can be visualized through the application below where an i-Cellulose-5 column was exposed to a series of aggressive solvents and performance was maintained.

While most chromatographers may not use strong solvents routinely, this robustness can be advantageous for method development and sample loading. The chemical ruggedness of Lux i-Cellulose-5 columns allows for the use of larger set of solvent systems which could potentially increase the success rate of chiral separations. Furthermore, with the ability to tolerate solvents such as DMSO, comes the ability to keep samples diluted in the strong organic solvents that are needed for sample solubility or maybe directly from a reaction mixture.

Learn more about Lux i-Cellulose-5 chiral analytical and preparative LC/SFC columns at www.phenomenex.com/Lux.

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