Twentieth Annual Spring Symposium

The Minnesota Chromatography Spring Symposium Committee is excited to announce the 20th Annual Spring Symposium Keynote Speaker! The Keynote Speaker will be Daniel Armstrong from University of Missouri, Rolla. His talk will be in the area of Chiral Separations.

There will also be many Focus Speakers. One of the Focus Speakers is co-sponsored by the Minnesota Mass Spectrometry Discussion Group.

This call for papers solicits contributions for general poster presentations from all areas of separation science. If your group has made interesting progress in chromatography, this is an excellent opportunity to share your work with your peers!

In appreciation of their efforts, each presenter will receive a small gift from MCF.

MCF will hold an election of officers at the Spring Symposium, May 18-20,1999. Open positions include; President-Elect, Secretary-Elect and Director. The general responsibilities of each position are listed below. This is a great opportunity to provide service to your colleagues and make new contacts.

President-Elect; Term 3 years, (1 year each as President-Elect, President and Past President)
Responsibilities:

• Serve as President in the absence of the President and immediate Past President
• Attend MCF Board Meetings
• Chair the program committee which conducts the technical meetings
• Organize the ballot for annual elections

Secretary-Elect : Term 2 years (1 year each as the Secretary Elect/Historian and Secretary)
Responsibilities
Secretary-Elect/Historian:

• Maintain, store and retrieve items appropriate for MCF archival records
• Provide back-up to Secretary
• Attend and participate at quarterly MCF Board meetings

• Take minutes of Board meetings
• Distribute minutes and associated documents to Board members
• Train newly elected Secretary-Elect/Historian on responsibilities
• Attend and participate at Board meetings

Director: Term 3 years ( at any given time there are 3 Directors)
Responsibilities:

• Each Director will arrange at least one meeting per year for each of three years
• Each Director is a voting member of the Governing Board and must be a member of the MCF

Dr. Leon Blumberg, formally of Hewlett-Packard, delivered two talks on the 26th of January. Both centered around methods of decreasing analysis time with a minimal reduction of resolution.

He began his first talk, "Column Optimization in Fast Capillary GC," by defining ‘fast’ as any separation in which the average peak width is less than 1 second. Noting that the Van Deemter-Golay equation only applies at low pressure (i.e., 10 psi or less), he discussed the implications of higher pressures on theory. At high pressure, Van Deemter plots give a much sharper parabolic curve, resulting in large differences in plate height for smaller changes in gas velocity. He continued by comparing the advantages of flow rate over gas velocity in theoretical discussions. When attempting to decrease analysis time, he suggested that decreasing column length is more effective than increasing flow rate while maintaining equivalent resolution.

In "Method Translation: Porting and Optimizing GC Methods," Dr. Blumberg compared the strategies of decreasing column length versus increasing flow rate, and introduced software which will calculate such parameters as column length and width, film thickness, and appropriate carrier gas when other parameters such as analysis time are specified. He maintains that the best procedure to follow during method development is to first develop the separation with temperature programming, and then tweak the flow rate to optimize. Rather than specifying specific temperature programs, analysts would do better to describe conditions in terms of void volumes: "100^oC for 4 void times, 10^oC per void time to 180^oC for 10 void times". Because void time is dependent on column dimensions and carrier gas, this allows greater applicability when transferring methods from one column or lab to another.

Present: S Anderson, L Charpentier, A Dallas, D Eikens, J Jopke, R Ravichadran, T Robison, P Sackett, D Whitman

Education Committee: In absentia, Kim reported that the Symposium courses are Technical Presentations, Chromatographic FTIR and Raman, and Troubleshooting LC Systems. Gary Reineccius is planning a beginning GC course in June or July, and long-term offerings will most likely be Advanced LC or GC Troubleshooting.

Symposium Committee: Four focus speakers have been proposed with the possibility of a 5^th. The number of focus speakers will have to reflect the constraints of the treasury, so this is still under debate. We have a block of rooms reserved at the Inn, the preliminary mailing has been sent to vendors and 1 booth is already confirmed.

Newsletter: The addition of undergraduate research papers was again discussed, and Luke and David W. will follow up and contact academic institutions to invite contributions.

Program: The winter meeting is set for 26 January, the spring meeting will involve Richard Baldwin speaking on CE on a chip sometime in the first week of April.

Old Business: The website had around 4000 hits since its inception, and the counter will be reset sometime in January for a fresh start.

As the Minnesota Chromatography Forum continues support of personalized attention to the membership body at the Earle Brown Heritage Center, the Education Committee has selected a wide variety of classes.

Instructors: Dr. David A. Whitman, Research Supervisor, 3M Pharmaceuticals

Dr. Maura G. Donovan, Research Manager Medtronic, Cell Biology group of Promeon Medical,

Instructor: Dr. James A. deHaseth Department of Chemistry, University of Georgia

Any undergraduate student who has the support of an advisor in designing and will support the implementation of the project is eligible.

How do I receive information?

At the beginning of January packets of information are mailed to scientific professors and college/university departments throughout the 5 state area. This packet includes the specific rules/requirements and submission deadlines. Contact your school's chemistry department or advisor for a copy of the packet. If they do not have information, please contact one of the people listed below ASAP.

How do I let the MCF know of perspective students?

Check with one of the people listed below to find out if their school and/or advisor is on the MCF UGA mailing list. We can let you know the school's current status and mail a packet to them if they are not currently included. While the MCF has an extensive database of colleges and universities, programs and faculty within the institutions can change. This may mean the possible omission of schools and faculty without our knowledge. Each year we are looking for new ways to promote this award at colleges and universities around the 5 state area. Any suggestions for reaching prospective students more effectively is greatly appreciated.