Explain5 marksChallenge
A mixture of three liquid organic compounds is separated by gas-liquid chromatography. The chromatograph uses a non-polar stationary phase and an unreactive gas as the mobile phase. The three compounds are butanone, hexane and propan-1-ol, all with similar boiling points. Their chromatogram shows three peaks, labelled X, Y and Z in order of increasing retention time.
Explain how the retention times of the three compounds are determined, and assign each labelled peak to one of the three compounds.