US 2004/0204864 A1 · Signal to noise ratio in chromatography

Abstract

Signals obtained in High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) are notoriously noisy. The signal can be improved by increasing the path length of the light passing through the sample, but increased path length also invites greater refraction and reflection of that light. A novel approach is to utilize a number of photocell sensors lined up along a capillary through which the solution passes. Through careful measurement and calculation, a signal for a single fluid particle can be produced by all the photocell sensors. By incorporating an appropriate delay between each signal, to take into account the finite speed of the fluid, the resulting plurality of noisy signals can be summed or statistically correlated. The signal, containing the important information about the fluid, will increase with the number of photocells used, while the noise increases by the square root of the number of photocells used. The signal to noise ratio, then, increases as the square of the number of photocells used. In this way, the effective path length is increased without including any moving parts.

Claims50

Dependent claims

A method for improving a quality of a signal in High Performance Liquid Chromatography by employing a plurality of stationary sensors, the method comprising:

(a) sensing information about a same fluid particle with each of the plurality of sensors and producing a plurality of individual signals, one for each stationary sensor, based on said information;
and
(b) summing said plurality of signals to create a signal with greater signal to noise ratio than any of the individual plurality of signals.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Signal to noise ratio in chromatography

Life of this patent

Signal to noise ratio in chromatography

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims50