Subcomponent self-assembly construction of tetrahedral cage Fe II 4 L 4 for high-resolution gas chromatographic separation.

Metal organic cages (MOCs), as an emerging discrete supramolecular compounds, have received widespread attention in separation, biomedicine, gas capture, catalysis, and molecular recognition due to their porosity, adjustability and stability. Herein, we present a new chiral MOC Fe ^II ₄ L ₄ coated capillary column prepared for gas chromatographic (GC) separation of different types of organic compounds, including n-alkanes, n-alcohols, alkylbenzenes, isomers, especially for racemic compounds. There are 20 different kinds of racemates (e.g., alcohols, ethers, epoxides, esters, alkenes, and aldehydes) were well resolved on the Fe ^II ₄ L ₄ chiral column and a maximum resolution value for 1-phenyl-1-propanol reaches 6.17. The Fe ^II ₄ L ₄ coated column exhibited high column efficiency (3100 plates m ^-1 for n-dodecane) and good enantiomeric resolution complementary to that of a commercial β-DEX 120 column and the previously reported chiral MOC [Fe ₄ L ₆ ] (ClO ₄ ) ₈ coated column. The relative standard deviation (RSDs) of the peak area and retention time of glycidol and nitrotoluene were below 1.2 %. This study reveals that chiral MOCs have good application prospects in chromatographic separation.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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