Abstract:

Based on some concepts from the Information Theory, the solvents used for antibiotic substances by Ishida etal and Betina were evaluated relative to each other by means of summarized chromatography. The information that a summarized chromatogram system supplies should depend mainly on three factors: (1) distribution of the R F of the reference substances in each solvent; (2) interrelationship between the R F values that a given substance shows in the different solvents; and (3) experimental error. Thus, admitting a constant error, it was found that among the 11 solvents tested, those that gave the most information were water; butanol; 3% aq. ammonium chloride; benzene-methanol (4:1) and butanol-methanol-water (4:1:2) with and without helianthin. The phenolic solvents were less informative; ethyl acetate is mediocre in all cases. Although the information is very high in some of the 11 solvents tested (up to 85% of H max ), only water supplies information independent of the others, which are redundant among each other. © 1970.