Abstract
High Pressure Size Exclusion (HPSEC) and Ion Exchange Chromatography (HPIEC) methods are being pioneered for the separation, detection and quantification of galacturonic acid oligomers. Efforts are focused on developing methods compatible with an evaporative light scattering detector (ELSD). An ELSD is a mass responsive detector that is compatible with gradient elution and offers high levels of sensitivity. Baseline separation of mono-, di- and tri-galacturonic acid has been accomplished by HPSEC with an acetic acid buffer. Values for k increased with increasing acetic acid concentration while R[subs] decreased. Urea was determined to be a suitable internal standard. HPIEC with a Hamilton PRP-X600 column and an ammonium formate buffer gradient was able to resolve oligogalacturonic acid oligomers greater than DP 30.
