Imidazoline type stationary phase for hydrophilic interaction chromatography and reversed-phase liquid chromatography

An imidazoline was prepared by solvent-free microwave-assisted organic synthesis and immobilized on porous silica particles by polymerization. The resulting material was composed of both hydrophobic alkyl ester chains and hydrophilic imidazoline rings, which gave it both hydrophilic interaction and reversed-phase characteristics. The titration curve suggests that the new material has buffering capacity and acquires increasing positive charge over the pH range 9–4, and is “zwitterionic” in the upper part of this pH range. Through investigating the effect of column temperature, the water content, pH and ion strength of mobile phase on the retention time of polar compounds in highly organic eluents, it was found that the new material could be used as a hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography (HILIC) stationary phase which involved a complex retention process consisting of partitioning, surface adsorption and electrostatic interactions. In addition, the retention behavior of aromatic compounds in different mobile phase conditions was also studied, which showed the new material mainly exhibited a partitioning mechanism in the reversed-phase liquid chromatography (RPLC) mode. The separation of six water-soluble vitamins and five aromatic compounds were achieved by using the new material in the HILIC and RPLC modes, respectively.