Using Nitrogen as a GC-MS Carrier Gas – Opportunities to Eliminate Reliance on Helium

This Expert Panel Webinar will discuss the historical events that have resulted in the consolidation on the use of helium as the GC carrier gas of choice and how those events may no longer apply for modern instrumentation.

The panelists will discuss the benefits of migration to alternative carrier gasses including hydrogen and, more importantly, nitrogen so that GC and GC-MS laboratories can eliminate their reliance on helium. With helium costs and increasing supply limitations, this topic is especially topical as some have estimated that helium may no longer be available for the chromatographic market within a relatively short time.

Key Learning Objectives:

1. How the consolidation to helium has come about

2. Why Helium reliance may cause significant impact to the analytical testing market

3. How GC-MS methodologies can be adapted to using nitrogen as carrier gas without analytical performance sacrifice

4. Why hydrogen may not be the best alternative to helium

Presenter: Frank Dorman (Resident Scholar and Senior Global Market Manager, Dartmouth College and Waters Corporation)

Frank Dorman is currently Senior Business Development Manager for Waters focusing on their global environmental business and, concurrently, a Resident Scholar in the Chemistry Department at Dartmouth College in Hanover, NH where he is active in teaching analytical chemistry to undergraduates and graduate students. In his role at Waters, Frank manages the research-focused environmental market, external collaborations, and interfaces with R&D for new product development. Prior to this, Frank was an Associate Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (BMB) sat Penn State University in University Park, PA. At Penn State, Frank served as a member of the Graduate Faculty in: Biochemistry, Microbiology and Molecular Biology (BMMB), Chemistry (CHEM), Biogeochemistry (BGC) and the Forensic Science Program (FRNSC) and the Center for Molecular Toxicology and Carcinogenesis. Franks scientific interests are in gas and liquid chromatography and fundamental characterization, instrumentation and column development, as well as mass spectrometry and atomic spectroscopy as applied to trace analysis in complex sample matrices.

Presenter: Jaap de Zeeuw (CEO, CreaVisions)

Located in The Netherlands, Jaap has 42 years of experience in GC capillary technology working for Chrompack, Varian and Restek. Jaap developed many PLOT columns and also the first bonded Wax column. He has published more than 100 articles in the field of GC related to column technology and applications, is the originator for applying a new GC technique for fastest GC/MS using a high vacuum inside the capillary column for which several patents were granted. Jaap has travelled widely and is well known for his technical expertise, publications and teaching skills. Jaap retired from Restek in 2022 and started a new company, called CreaVisions, CreaVisions offers besides GC-consultation and GC-masterclasses also a class for creative problem solution, basically to learn how to think outside the box to generate unique ideas.

Presenter: Chris English (Laboratory Manager, Restek Corporation)

Chris English has managed a team of chemists in Restek’s innovations laboratory since 2004. Before taking the reins of the laboratory, he spent seven years as an environmental applications chemist and was critical to the development of Restek’s current line of volatile GC columns. Prior to joining Restek, he operated a variety of gas chromatographic systems, conducting method development and sample analysis for a global laboratory testing network. Chris holds a B.S. in environmental science from Saint Michael’s College, USA.