MICRO FLOW-RATE PARTICLE BEAM INTERFACE FOR CAPILLARY LIQUID-CHROMATOGRAPHY MASS-SPECTROMETRY

A laboratory-made aerosol generator has been developed to interface the effluent of a HPLC Packed capillary column and a quadrupole mass spectrometer. The new coupling device is designed to be fully compatible with a commercially available desolvation chamber and the momentum separator of a Hewlett-Packard 59980B particle beam unit. The aerosol generated by minimal solvent input (1-5 muL/min) allows an improved signal response for high water content mobile phases, yielding improved chromatographic performance during gradient analysis. Sensitivity is also improved by the scaled-down flow rate. Reversed-phase analysis has been performed on a mixture of human hormones using the new interface. Unnoticeable instrument contamination due to mobile-phase introduction was observed over a 6-month working period.