Waters Introduces the New ACQUITY Arc System, Designed as a Bridge between HPLC and UPLC Methods

Waters Corporation today introduced the Waters^® ACQUITY^® Arc™ System, a quaternary liquid chromatograph that gives analytical laboratories running established LC methods a clear choice for replicating or improving their separations performance. With this new addition to the ACQUITY product line, the new ACQUITY Arc System is specifically engineered to respond to the needs of analytical scientists for a single LC platform that can enable them to efficiently transfer, adjust or improve their methods regardless of the LC platform on which they were developed. Waters intends to begin shipping the ACQUITY Arc system to customers at the end of June.

To date, scientists working with established methods haven’t had an LC platform versatile enough to bridge the gap between HPLC and UPLC^®. With the introduction of the ACQUITY Arc System, and its enabling Arc Multi-flow path™ technology, scientists now have the ability to emulate the gradient dwell volume and mixing behavior of various LC systems. By selecting the appropriate fluidic path, the ACQUITY Arc System can easily emulate a variety of HPLC systems without altering the method’s gradient table, or provide UHPLC performance with the flip of a switch.

“Since the beginning, each addition to the ACQUITY family has been designed to allow a broader range of scientists to benefit from this family of products without compromising what they do,” said Ian King, Waters Vice President of Separation Science for the Waters Division. “ACQUITY Arc continues this tradition by providing scientists with technology that is adaptable and robust enough to bridge the HPLC and UPLC performance gap while continuing to support validated assays.”

In addition to replicating established HPLC assays without altering the gradient table, the ACQUITY Arc System can enable improved chromatographic performance of methods by leveraging 2.5 - 2.7 micron particle column technologies, as well as support previously developed applications on 3 - 5 micron HPLC columns.

King attributed the Company’s decision to introduce the new ACQUITY Arc System to Waters’ ongoing commitment to meeting the needs of the marketplace.

“At Waters we are driven by two key goals—always be responsive to and evolve alongside our clients’ needs, and never compromise when it comes to the science. When we found that some segments of the market were limited in their ability to adopt UPLC technology, be it due to regulatory issues or continued support of established methods, we were committed to develop a solution that would enable our customers to be successful in adopting a modern LC platform.”

King also noted that Waters approached this as an engineering challenge, looking at how the Company can offer customers true plug-and-play method compatibility for HPLC and UHPLC separations. “The result,” he added, “isn’t just a new product, but a long-term solution to dealing with legacy methods.”

Waters is offering a full complement of LC detectors for the ACQUITY Arc System, including photodiode array, UV/Vis, fluorescence, refractive index and evaporative light scattering. The system is also fully compatible with Waters’ market-leading mass detector, the ACQUITY QDa^®. In addition, the ACQUITY Arc System features novel Auto-Blend Plus™ Technology that enables the operator to program directly % organic and % pH gradients to significantly reduce human error and the manual labor associated with preparing buffered mobile phases. The ACQUITY Arc System is controlled through Waters industry-leading informatics packages of Empower^® 2 or Empower 3 software.