HIGH-PERFORMANCE ANION-EXCHANGE CHROMATOGRAPHY OF SUGARS AND SUGAR ALCOHOLS ON QUATERNARY AMMONIUM RESINS UNDER ALKALINE CONDITIONS

Ninety-three sugars and sugar alcohols of one to four monosaccharide units were subjected to high-performance anion-exchange chromatography on three quaternary ammonium columns of the same size and virtually the same composition under identical eluent flow rates (1 mL.min-1) and compositions (aqueous 0.1 N NaOH). Although the columns had very different histories of use, their different capacity factors for individual carbohydrates can be linearly correlated. Those for monosaccharides are lowest for sugar alcohols, and are higher and roughly similar for analogous aldoses and ketoses. There is a general trend, strongest with sugar alcohols, for capacity factors to increase with increasing numbers of carbon atoms. Increasing numbers of hydroxyl groups on residues of similar structure lead to increasing capacity factors. For members of homologous oligosaccharide series, capacity factors increase in a regular and predictable manner with chain length. Peak areas for different sugars generated by a differential refractometer are roughly correlated with mass concentration; with a pulsed amperometric detector, there are equally rough correlations with either molar or mass concentration.