Temperature effects in liquid chromatography

Temperature has a large effect on retention, selectivity, and column efficiency and has long been accepted as an important parameter in liquid chromatography (LC). Despite this fact, temperature has not been very actively utilized in the past, mainly because of reported stability problems of the most commonly used stationary phases. However, more interest in the application of temperature for retention control has come of late because of the trend of miniaturization in chromatography and the availability of temperature-stable stationary phases. This work gives an overview of temperature effects on retention and selectivity in chromatography, especially on reversed-phase columns. Instrumental requirements, especially with respect to performing temperature gradient elution, are discussed and applications on both conventional-sized analytical columns and capillary columns are included.