Which application area is correctly paired with chromatography?

Which application area is correctly paired with chromatography?

• A. Forensic science — Dating crime scenes.
• B. Environmental analysis — Monitoring pollutants in air, water, and soil.
• C. Pharmaceuticals — Synthesizing drugs.
• D. Food testing — Measuring taste thresholds.

Answer: (B)

Chromatography is all about separating components of a mixture so you can identify and measure each part, even when they’re present in very small amounts. That makes it especially powerful for environmental analysis, where air, water, and soil samples contain many different chemicals at trace levels. Techniques like GC and HPLC (often with mass spectrometry) let you separate pollutants such as pesticides, VOCs, and other organic contaminants and determine their concentrations accurately. This is exactly what “environmental analysis — monitoring pollutants in air, water, and soil” describes, so it’s the best pairing. The other options don’t fit as naturally. Dating crime scenes isn’t a chromatography goal; chromatography helps identify substances found at a scene, but not establish a date. Synthesizing drugs is about making them, while chromatography is key for purification and quality control, not the synthesis step itself. Measuring taste thresholds is a sensory task; chromatography might analyze flavor compounds, but it doesn’t measure taste thresholds directly.

Chromatography is all about separating components of a mixture so you can identify and measure each part, even when they’re present in very small amounts. That makes it especially powerful for environmental analysis, where air, water, and soil samples contain many different chemicals at trace levels. Techniques like GC and HPLC (often with mass spectrometry) let you separate pollutants such as pesticides, VOCs, and other organic contaminants and determine their concentrations accurately. This is exactly what “environmental analysis — monitoring pollutants in air, water, and soil” describes, so it’s the best pairing.

The other options don’t fit as naturally. Dating crime scenes isn’t a chromatography goal; chromatography helps identify substances found at a scene, but not establish a date. Synthesizing drugs is about making them, while chromatography is key for purification and quality control, not the synthesis step itself. Measuring taste thresholds is a sensory task; chromatography might analyze flavor compounds, but it doesn’t measure taste thresholds directly.