Fast enantiomeric analysis of a complex essential oil with an innovative multidimensional gas chromatographic system

The present research is focussed on the evaluation of a recently developed high performance multidimensional gas chromatographic (MDGC) system employed in the fast analysis of a series of chiral compounds contained in rosemary essential oil. The heart of the MDGC system consists in a simple transfer device for the rapid sequential re-injection of analyte “heart-cuts” from the first to the second dimension. The transfer system has no temperature restrictions, presents very low dead volumes and achieves multidimensional analysis through a pressure-balance mechanism. The MDGC set-up is characterized by two GC ovens (enabling independent temperature programming) and the possibility of mass spectrometric (MS) and/or flame ionization detection (FID). Multiple-cut conventional and fast MDGC–FID methods were developed and the results obtained compared, in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the system. In this respect, the rapid method provided the same analytical result in a greatly reduced time (approximately five times less). Furthermore, quali/quantitative data reproducibilty was very good. Fast MDGC was achieved by using micro-bore (0.1 mm I.D.) columns in both dimensions.