The Cromite sample probe is a completely new approach for sample collection, storage, measuring, cleaning, and injection.
In traditional chromatography a contamination free sample introduction is hard to achieve. Usually various in-line devices such as in-line filter that can be easily replaced or cleaned after several injections are added to the system. Another such component is a guard column, which is essentially a small column connected to the main separation column that can be easily replaced when it becomes plugged with insoluble matter. The guard column is smaller than the main column and is less expensive.
To eliminate contamination by sample matter, different cleaning techniques are used. Sample filtering before injection is one such process. However, this requires much more sample than is actually required for analysis. Another cleaning technique is centrifuge cleaning. This also requires extra sample and takes time and additional equipment.
Another cleaning technique is solid phase extraction (SPE) is expensive required complex manual operation or sophisticated robotic systems. There are many other techniques that are employed to clean samples in preparation for chromatographic analysis, but all cleaning techniques are time consuming, require excess sample, or use some additional disposable components or additional equipment. In addition, they are prone to have a negative effect on the accuracy of sample’s quantitative results, especially in trace analysis, since every additional step in sample manipulation causes some irreversible analyte loss. An additional problem is that the sample in all these cleaning processes require that the holding container be changed several times and this complicates tracking of the original sample to the analysis result. Also further problem associated with the use of different sample cleaning equipment is the potential cross-contamination of the samples.
Most of this problems are resolved with simple Cromite sample probe. The real advantage come from the patented idea to have a single container for every injection not for every sample. This allows to clean every injection individually by unified way and sample never leaves the container it was collected by.