books and software A relaxed and informal LC text
More Practical Problem Solving in HPLC Stavros Kromidas John Wiley & Sons, 2005, 309 pp, $75, www.wiley.com
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his paperback is a continuation of the first book by Kromidas, which appeared in 2000, entitled Practical Problem Solving in HPLC. After obtaining his Ph.D., Kromidas worked as a sales manager for Waters Corp. until he founded his own consulting firm, Novia GmbH. It is very clear from his writings that he has extensive, hands-on, practical experience as an HPLC consultant and practitioner. He also has wide-ranging and knowledgeable contacts in the HPLC community, some of whom contributed sections of the book. Kromidas, clearly a world expert on the practical and theoretical aspects of HPLC, authored the majority of the text. This is no ordinary overview of HPLC —it is more a collection of short vignettes or anecdotes about problems that may arise in HPLC and how to overcome them. Each individual case study is 1–3 pages and includes figures and tables as needed. The anecdotes are posed as questions, for example: What can I do if the peaks elute late, what causes a ghost peak (ghosts, of course!), and when could one expect a change in the elution order of the peaks? There are also some entertaining items, such as a chromatography crossword, an HPLC quiz, and an HPLC fairy tale. Individual sections provide some general material and cover stationary phases and columns, buffers, pH, optimization and peak homogeneity, troubleshooting, general HPLC tips, LC/MS
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coupling, micro- and nano-LC, and quantification. A very useful appendix gives solutions to some of the quizzes, empirical formulas and correlations used every day in HPLC, Internet addresses, informational resources, and future trends. This book is not meant to be read cover-to-cover at a single sitting. Rather, it should be consulted when difficulties arise or when one needs to solve a specific problem. It meets this goal very nicely and is to be congratulated in doing so. The book is incredibly useful and welcome. It is written in a somewhat idiosyncratic manner, almost off-thecuff, very relaxed and informal. It is a very easy read for those who have practiced HPLC for a few decades or so but would be more difficult for novices and students. This is not the very first book to be read by someone just starting to work with HPLC or chromatography, because it assumes that one already
knows a lot about the basic instrumentation and about how to read a chromatogram, change mobile phases, modify gradients, and so forth. This is a practical problem-solving text with little in the way of equations or theory. In summary, the book provides an unusual and novel way to solve HPLC problems in a most practical manner. It presents almost 100 new examples for optimization, troubleshooting, and instrument performance, beyond those that appeared in Kromidas’s first book. This is a valuable and worthwhile addition to the library of any company, government agency, university or college, or individual user of HPLC—it should stand alongside other problem-solving books (Bidlingmeyer’s text, Dolan’s LCGC columns, etc.). Reviewed by Ira Krull, Northeastern University
Books Received b b Analytical Method Validation and Instrument Performance Chung Chow Chan, Y. C. Lee, Herman Lam, and Xue-Ming Zhang, Eds. John Wiley & Sons, 2004, 303 pp, $90, www.wiley.com
b Calculation of NMR and EPR Parameters: Theory and Applications Martin Kaupp, Michael Bühl, and Vladimir G. Malkin, Eds. John Wiley & Sons, 2004, 603 pp, $200, www.wiley.com
This multi-author text is intended for those in the pharmaceutical industry whose job is to ensure high-quality data. In the preface, Chan states that this book addresses two of the three pillars of data generation—method validation and instrument calibration. One chapter presents an overview of pharmaceutical development; 7 chapters address method validation (potency, HPLC, dissolution, automated methods, heavy metals, bioanalysis, and inactive ingredients); and 10 chapters cover instrument calibration (general procedures, spectrophotometers, HPLC, CE, LC/MS, Karl Fisher, pH, environmental chambers, computers, and spreadsheets). Of the 17 authors, 7 work for Lilly, 6 for GlaxoSmithKline, and 4 for Vicuron, Agilent, Patheon, and Novex Pharma.
The foreword states that “the calculation of magnetic resonance parameters . . . can significantly enhance the utility of magnetic resonance techniques when empirical interpretations are insufficient.” Some of the 36 chapter titles include Fundamentals of Nonrelativistic and Relativistic Theory of NMR and EPR Parameters, Spin–Spin Coupling Constants with HF and DFT Methods, NMR Parameters in Proteins and Nucleic Acids, Zero-Field Splitting, and Computation of Hyperfine Coupling Tensors to Complement EPR Experiments. Most of the 50 authors are from the U.S. and Germany, but also included are authors from Canada, Finland, France, Norway, the Slovak Republic, Australia, Croatia, the Czech Republic, the U.K., New Zealand, Poland, and Switzerland.
© 2005 AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY
