Understanding the fragmentation of glucose in mass spectrometry

The fragmentation mechanism of D-glucose was investigated in detail by two different fragmentation techniques, namely, collision-induced dissociation (CID) and infrared multiphoton dissociation (IRMPD) using all six ¹³C-labeled isotopomers and ²H-labeled isotopomers. For both CID and IRMPD energy-resolved measurements were carried out. Individual fragmentation pathways were studied at MS² and MS³ levels. Additionally, we have developed an HPLC-tandem MS method to separate the anomers of D-glucose using a HILIC column and investigated their fragmentation patterns individually. We propose a complete fragmentation landscape of D-glucose, demonstrating that a rather simple multifunctional molecule displays extreme complexity in gas phase dissociation, following multiple parallel fragmentation routes yielding a total of 23 distinct fragment ions. The results allowed a detailed formulation of the complex fragmentation mechanism of D-glucose. The results have immediate consequences for the full structure analysis of complex carbohydrates.