separation of the species from the fluid by chemical attachment of the species to the surface channeled polymer fibers 20 it may be possible to use a single fiber in lab on a chip separations studies are proposed to further evaluate the potential of using channeled polymer fibers in analytical and prep scale separations the actual experimental procedure will involve a three prong approach including 1 development of column packing methodology 2 use of atomic force microscopy to study the chemical basis of chemical specificity and 3 investigations into on column derivatization of the base polymer fibers the preliminary studies involve manual packing of the polymer fibers into the steel tubing columns 22 as depicted schematically in fig1 as shown in the expanded window of fig1 the present columns 22 have appreciable amounts of dead volume along the flow axis the quality of any subsequent chemical separation is based on the uniformity of the packing of the stationary phase fibers 20 in the column 22 with regards to dead volume i e where turbulence can occur and molecule surface interactions are absent therefore a reliably reproducible way of packing the columns 22 with the channeled fibers 20 is needed before mass production of columns 22 is economically feasible high quality reproducible columns 22 are required to adequately study the underlying mechanisms of retention desirably radial compression technologies can be employed to effect more uniform packing of the fibers 20 for example the steel tubing can be replaced desirably with tubing formed of polyethylene pe and the resulting column 22 then can be surrounded by a water jacket increases in pressure applied to.