Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatography (UPLC): A Preeminent Technique in Pharmaceutical Analysis.

Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatography (UPLC) is a relatively new technique giving new possibilities in liquid chromatography, especially concerning decrease of time and solvent consumption. UPLC chromatographic system is designed in a special way to withstand high system back-pressures. Special analytical columns UPLC BEH C18 packed with 1.7 μm particles are used in connection with this system. The quality control analyses of various pharmaceutical formulations are transferred from HPLC to UPLC system. The UPLC system allows shortening analysis time up to nine times and three times comparing to the conventional system using 5 μm and 3 μm particle packed analytical columns respectively. The negative effect of particle size decrease is back-pressure increase about nine times (versus 5 μm) or three times (versus 3 μm), respectively. The separation on UPLC is performed under very high pressures (up to 100 MPa) but it has no negative influence on analytical column or other components of chromatography system. Separation efficiency remains maintained or is even improved by UPLC.