Anion chromatography with low-conductivity eluents

A simple system is described for the separation and determination of mixtures of inorganic and organic anions. The anions are separated on a column containing a macroporous anion-exchange resin which has a very low exchange capacity of 0.007–0.07 mequiv./g. Because of the low resin capacity, only a very dilute solution ( ca. 10 −4 M) of an aromatic organic acid salt is needed as the eluent. The eluent conductance is sufficiently low that a suppressor column is not needed, and the separated anions can be detected with a simple conductance detector. Numerous examples of actual separations are shown. In some instances concentrations of anions below 1 ppm could be detected. The applicability of the system to real samples is demonstrated by several examples.