The Satinder Ahuja Award for Young Investigators in Separation Science

Session 1120

Room 205A

8:30–11:50 a.m.

This symposium will honor Zachary Breitbach of AbbVie, the winner of the 2018 Satinder Ahuja Award for Young Investigators in Separation Science. This award is given by the Subdivision of Chromatography and Separations Chemistry of the Analytical Division of the American Chemical Society.

Breitbach will kick off the symposium with a talk on the chiral selectors and hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography (HILIC) stationary phases based on cyclofructans. When cyclofructans are derivatized and bonded to silica, they make exceptional chiral stationary phases for high-performance LC (HPLC). The evaluation of more 20 cyclofructan derivatives allowed for the identification of three that are most successful. These phases have been used in a variety of applications, such as the separation of chiral agrochemicals, illicit drugs, and metal complexes. Recently, cyclofructan-based chiral and HILIC selectors have been bonded to superficially porous particles and ultrahigh-pressure LC (UHPLC) silica to produce high-throughput and highly efficient separations.

The topic of chiral separations will continue in the second talk, by Dan Armstrong of the University of Texas at Arlington. New and improved chiral methods are becoming essential for many of biological and pharmacological studies because they provide greater selectivity, enhanced efficiency and analysis speed. Examples will be given on the role of chiral separations in many areas, such as the analysis of synthetic non-tobacco derived products, natural products, and D-amino acid studies in biological systems.

Chris Welch of Welch Innovation (and formerly of the pharmaceutical company Merck) will then present a survey of different strategies for chromatographic method development in pharmaceutical research and development, with particular emphasis on how the field has evolved over time. He will assess the current state of the art, discuss recent trends and approaches, and highlight future prospects and capability gaps.

After the break, Jared Anderson of Iowa State University will discuss magnetic ionic liquids for rapid nucleic acid extraction and analysis. Rapid nucleic acid analysis has become a vital component for clinical diagnostics, food safety, genomics, and microbiology. However, the isolation of sufficiently pure nucleic acids represents a significant bottleneck in DNA analysis. Anderson will discuss progress in the development of hydrophobic magnetic ionic liquid (MIL) solvents that are capable of rapidly extracting DNA and mRNA from biological samples.

Jonathan P. Smuts of VUV Analytics will close the symposium with a talk on the use of gas chromatography–vacuum ultraviolet spectroscopy (GC­-VUV) in quality control of three industries. GC-VUV allows for full spectrum acquisition from 125 - 240 nm at rates as high as 90 Hz. Judicious choice of spectral filters during data processing allows for signal-to-noise optimization and qualitative distinction of classes of compounds. The additive nature of Beers Law allows for the deconvolution of co-eluting compounds, even isomers, when spectra are distinct.