Finding an Alternative Column for the Separation of Antibiotics on XTerra RP using a Column Classification System

Abstract

A project to develop a test procedure to characterize reversed‐phase liquid chromatographic C₁₈ columns was started earlier and resulted in a fast, simple, repeatable, and reproducible test procedure. In this paper, the separations of two antibiotics (erythromycin and tetracycline) from their respective impurities were examined. Both methods were developed on XTerra RP, a hybrid column. The performance of the column classification system was evaluated by finding an alternative column for the XTerra RP column. The column classification system was helpful in the selection of a suitable column for the separation of erythromycin, but also showed its limitations towards the separation of tetracycline. The addition of an efficiency parameter and/or omission of one of the original parameters did not improve the results.

Keywords:

• Test procedure
• Reversed‐phase liquid chromatographic C₁₈ columns
• Erythromycin
• Tetracycline
• XTerra RP

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the manufacturers and the suppliers for the gift of columns.

K. Kóczián thanks the Ministry of the Flemish Community for financial support.

S. Dragovic enjoys a scholarship of the Government of Serbia, “Fund of Young Talents.”

E. Adams is a post‐doctoral fellow of the Fund for Scientific Research (FWO)−Flanders, Belgium.

Financial support to this project was given by a Research Grant of the Fund for Scientific Research‐Flanders (Belgium).