A miniaturized evaporative light scattering detector for application with packed microcolumn high-performance liquid chromatography

A miniaturized evaporative light scattering detector (ELSD) compatible with packed microcolumn high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) has been developed. In such a detector, it is particularly important that an efficient nebulization of the column effluent is achieved. Therefore, the geometry of the nebulizer has been optimized. Detector performance was demonstrated for acetonitrile–acetone at 5–100 μL min−1 as mobile phase, a packed microcolumn, 0.7 mm i.d. was used. Isocratic and gradient elutions were performed. Detection limit was lower than 8 ng. Linear range was 30–300 ng. Quantitative analysis of cohune oil components separated on a C-18 column using gradient elution was examined. The relative standard deviation (RSD) in peak areas was 1.9–3.7% for large peaks. Minor peaks gave higher RSD.