The quality of quantitation in chromatography Part I. Information theoretical considerations

An extension to Shannonʹs information theory, permitting to calculate the channel capacity of a Chromatographic column, is proposed. The channel capacity determines the maximum amount of information passing through the column and with that the uncertainty (error) of the peak area estimation. The possibility to calculate the efficiency of a Chromatographic system in terms of information theory is proposed. The properties of signal and noise have to be described by the power spectral density function. Knowing that the properties of a peak are dependent on the retention time, the change of the information rate can be calculated as a function of the retention time of the peak.