Development of a portable micro gas chromatography system for field deployable air quality monitoring

Abstract

Among various gas analytical methods, Gas Chromatography (GC) is one of the most reliable technologies to quantitatively analyze gas mixtures. However, the conventional GCs suffer from those bulky sizes, complicated processes (sampling, storage, shipping and analysis), high power consumption, and inability for real-time monitoring in the field. These drawbacks can be solved by miniaturization of a GC system, thereby enabling the field-deployable real-time analysis. The MEMS fabrication technology is capable of miniaturizing three key components consisting of a GC system. In order to provide a better capability of rapid on-site air quality monitoring, we have developed a fully automated micro GC system integrated with microfabricated components of a GC system; a preconcentrator, a micro separate column, and a gas sensor. In this study, we present the preliminary testing of a portable GC system. On the basis of our preliminary results, our micro GC can play a critical roles in various academic/industrial fields such as environmental and industrial monitoring, disease diagnosis, explosive detection, etc.