Chemical Forums
Chemistry Forums for Students => Organic Chemistry Forum => Topic started by: Babcock_Hall on April 07, 2025, 06:18:38 PM
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For a given volume of silica, is it better to have a tall, narrow column or a broad, short column. My first guess would be tall and narrow, but I am not sure. In gel filtration (size exclusion) chromatography of proteins, tall and narrow is better. In ion-exchange chromatography of proteins, short and broad generally gives better resolution. In ion-exchange chromatography one typically uses a gradient of NaCl, and therein may lie the difference between how they respond to column dimensions. This question came up recently in our purification of a thiol, as discussed in a companion thread.
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I have the impression that a long time ago, the tall-narow was more popular. I often worked in the 100mg-1g scale and purified a lot on a column that was ca 10-30cm long and 3 cm wide, the glass column was a lot longer, but I rarely packed it full.