Computer analysis of amino acid chromatograms and other linear elution spectra

A computer-aided method of evaluation of amino acid column chromatograms is proposed and compared with the usual synchronous peak-integration method. Spectra and their backgrounds are digitized separately by a curve digitizer; this allows a better estimate of the background time courses. A computer program then fits a set of superimposed Gaussian distributions to each corrected spectrum, thus circumventing the problems arising from incompletely separated peaks. Samples of known composition, run intermittently through the analyzer between the unknown spectra, allow a determination of the time dependence of the ratios of “peak areas over amounts of amino acids”; hence, the amounts of amino acids can automatically be corrected for aging effects of the analyzing system. A modified version of the computer program allows resolution of any spectrum to a sum of Gaussians, with least squares fitting of their amplitudes, widths and locations