GC×GC Detective Stories: Closing the Case?

Pierre-Hugues Stefanuto on the achievements, bottlenecks and open questions in modern GC×GC

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GC×GC has matured from a specialist technique into a tool used across fields including fuels, environmental monitoring, food, forensics, metabolomics, and breath analysis.
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GC×GC’s central strength is separating compounds that co-elute in one-dimensional chromatography, revealing minor constituents hidden beneath larger peaks.
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Its structured two-dimensional plots support interpretation in applications such as process monitoring, clinical research, and regulatory testing.
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The main barriers have shifted from instrumentation to operator training, time-consuming data processing, and a lack of standardized formats and procedures.
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GC×GC is not necessary for every analysis; users should choose it when the analytical question requires resolving co-eluting compounds and its added information justifies the complexity.

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