Since its introduction into the armoury of the analytical chemist approximately two decades ago the technique of gas chroma tography has found very extensive applications in the analysis of most types of organic compounds. One of the few remaining limitations of the technique when applied to such compounds, namely the analysis of very highly boiling and or thermally unstable substances, has been overcome in many instances by the introduction of techniques such as silation for the conversion of sample components to lower boiling or more stable substances which can be gas chromatographed at reasonably low temperatures. All of this has been extensively dealt with in many books published during recent years dealing with the theory and practice of applying gas chromatography to the analysis and preparative separation of organic compounds. In parallel with these developments there has occurred, particu larly over the past decade, a growing interest in the application of gas chromatography to the analysis of organometallic compounds. Indeed, for many types of organometallic compounds, gas chromatography is the analytical method of choice particularly, as so often happens, when the sample is a mixture. To the author's knowledge no complete review exists of the published work in this very interesting new field; a situation it is hoped the present volume will rectify.
