Using Faster Gas Chromatography Analyses in Brewing Analytics

Tomáš Horák^1,2, Jiří Čulík¹, Vladimír Kellner¹, Marie Jurková¹ and Pavel Čejka¹
¹ Research Institute of Brewing and Malting PLC, Brewing Institute Prague, Lípová 15, CZ–120 44 Prague 2, Czech Republic.
² Corresponding author
E-mail: horak@beerresearch.cz.

J. Inst. Brew. 115(3), 214–219, 2009 | VIEW ARTICLE

ABSTRACT
Dominant trends in analytical chemistry include miniaturization in sample preparation techniques and faster run times to provide high-throughput screening, fast process monitoring and fast method development. This study focused on the application of narrow bore gas chromatographic capillary columns, 0.18 mm internal diameter, for brewing analyses. On these capillary columns, faster analyses could be performed compared to conventional GC capillary columns using 0.32 to 0.53 mm internal diameters. The robustness of the state-of-the-art faster capillary gas chromatography, without compromising resolution, has been demonstrated with the analyses of beer flavour compounds such as lower and higher alcohols, esters and other volatile compounds such as acetaldehyde and dimethyl sulphide in beer. These methods were able to reduce sample run times by 60%.

Key words:
analytics, beer, beer flavours, brewing, faster gas chromatography.