New equations describing the combined effect of pH and organic modifier concentration on the retention in reversed-phase liquid chromatography

Six equations that express the combined effect of mobile phase pH and organic modifier content on sample retention in reversed-phase liquid chromatography (RPLC) are developed based on either the adsorption or the partition model for retention. The equations are tested against five retention data sets taken from literature. In the tests two pH scales are used, wwpH and sspH. It is shown that a new seven-parameter equation works more satisfactorily, because it exhibits good numerical behavior, gives low values of the sum of squares of residuals and represents the experimental retention surfaces successfully. In addition, the danger of overfitting, which leads to the prediction of physically meaningless retention surfaces, is minimized by using the proposed new seven-parameter equation. Finally, the possibility of obtaining reliable pK values of weak acids or bases chromatographically by means of the derived equations is also considered and discussed.