## 1 Introduction  
Monoliths are a single continuous rod of highly porous material polymerized _in situ_ within a mould with an interconnected network of pores that form channels through which liquids can flow. Monoliths have found a wide range of uses in analytical science such as their incorporation into microfluidic platforms [1], high efficiency chromatographic separations or low resolution _\"digital chromatography\"_ (bind and elute methods) in the form of solid phase extraction. The reader is directed to a number of excellent reviews that have appeared in the literature [2; 3], particularly some reviews which specifically focus on polymer monoliths for the separation of small molecules [4; 5; 6; 7; 8]. Monoliths are broadly subdivided between inorganic (mainly silica) and organic monoliths, the latter having previously been considered more suited to the gradient separation of large biomolecules rather than the isocratic separation of smaller (<500 Da) molecules due to their relatively low surface area (<50 m\({}^{2}\)/g). However, it has been shown that low surface area is not the sole factor that limits chromatographic efficiency for small molecules. Rather, studies by [PERSON] _et al._[8; 9; 10; 11] have revealed that maximizing chromatographic efficiency under equilibrium (isocratic) conditions actually relies upon a more complex strategy involving the combined optimization of both the surface area/microscopic morphological properties as well as the nanoscale gel porosity (which can induce stagnant mass transfer zones, thus increasing resistance to mass transfer within the porous, globule-scale polymer matrix). [PERSON] [11] and [PERSON] _et al._[12] have demonstrated that the gel porosity of the polymer scaffold can be optimised for small molecules depending upon the percentage of organic modifier in the mobile phase. Furthermore, the gel porosity is absent in the monolith's dry-state such that dry-state monolith characterisation methods alone (nitrogen adsorption analysis or scanning electron microscopy) are insufficient to fully explain the chromatographic performance of polymer monoliths [11]. [PERSON] _et al._ demonstrated the benefits of alternative methods with commercial styrene and methacrylate monoliths such as confocal Raman spectroscopy imaging and atomic force microscopy [13]. Notable successful efforts to improve chromatographic performance include stopping monolith polymerisation reactions before completion. [PERSON] _et al._[14] expanded upon earlier work by Bonn's group [15; 16] by demonstrating that the surface area of styrene monoliths could be increased from 5-6 m\({}^{2}\)/g to 100 m\({}^{2}\)/g by reducing the polymerisation time from 48 h to 3 h, respectively. Completely polymerized material (48 h) exhibited high peak widths and increased retention relative to the three hour material, and the authors observed that the enhanced performance for monoliths derived from incomplete conversion was less affected by specific surface area, rather than the gel porosity of the solvated polymer globules. Similar observations were made for methacrylate-based monoliths subjected to incomplete polymerisation [17], reducing the polymerisation time from 48 h to 30 min, which resulted in decreased retention for alkylbenzenes and significantly decreased plate heights, despite relatively low BET surface area of 5.85 m\({}^{2}\)/g (30 min polymerisation). Another notable example of relatively low surface area monoliths exhibiting high chromatographic efficiency was reported recently by the [PERSON] group [18], who used a cross-linker with multiple acrylate groups (dipentaerythnitol penta-/hexa-acrylate, DPEPA) to prepare a poly(lauryl methacrylate-_co_-DPEPA) monolith for the isocratic separation of alkylbenzenes resulting in 110,000-165,000 N/m.