Position-specific carbon isotope analysis of trichloroacetic acid by gas chromatography/isotope ratio mass spectrometry

Trichloroacetic acid (TCAA) is an important environmental contaminant present in soils, water and plants. A method for determining the carbon isotope signature of the trichloromethyl position in TCAA using gas chromatography/combustion/isotope ratio mass spectrometry (GC/C/IRMS) was developed and tested with TCAA from different origins. Position-specific isotope analysis (PSIA) can provide direct information on the kinetic isotope effect for isotope substitution at a specific position in the molecule and/or help to distinguish different sources of a compound. The method is based on the degradation of TCAA into chloroform (CF) and CO? by thermal decarboxylation. Since thermal decarboxylation is associated with strong carbon isotope fractionation (ε = -34.6 ± 0.2‰) the reaction conditions were optimized to ensure full conversion. The combined isotope ratio of CF and CO? at the end of the reaction corresponded well to the isotope ratio of TCAA, confirming the reliability of the method. A method quantification limit (MQL) for TCAA of 18.6 μg/L was determined. Samples of TCAA produced by enzymatic and non-enzymatic chlorination of natural organic matter (NOM) and some industrially produced TCAA were used as exemplary sources. Significant different PSIA isotope ratios were observed between industrial TCAA and TCAA samples produced by chlorination of NOM. This highlights the potential of the method to study the origin and the fate of TCAA in the environment.     

Routine analysis by high precision gas chromatography/mass selective detector/isotope ratio mass spectrometry to 0.1 parts per mil

Stable isotope methods are potentially quite useful for validating natural or enhanced mineral degradation of contaminants. For this reason, a continuous flow gas chromatograph (GC), isotope ratio mass spectrometer (IRMS) has been coupled with a quadrupole mass selective detector (MSD) to allow simultaneous mass spectral and stable carbon isotope ratio data to be obtained from a single chromatographic analysis. This allows the target contaminant and any extra-cellular degradation intermediates to be both qualified and quantified. Previously acceptable limits of precision (0.3 parts per mil) are undesirable given the small fractionation observed during aerobic degradation. To further understand the fate of organic contaminants and to gain information about the metabolic degradative pathway employed by a microorganism, routine isotopic analyses on a range of analytes have been performed. Quantities of sample producing mass-44 ion beam signal (I(44)) of 2 x 10(-10) to 1 x 10(-8) A were analysed. When the IRMS was tuned for high sensitivity, ion source nonlinearities were overcome by peak height correction from an algorithm that was produced using known isotopic standards of varying concentrations. This led to sample accuracy of <0.01 per thousand and sample precision of 0.1 per thousand. Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Memory effects in combining isotope ratio monitoring with isotope dilution mass spectrometry

Combining isotope ratio monitoring with isotope dilution techniques provides very accurate results in the quantitative analysis of volatile organic chemical compounds by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS). However, this method requires that spikes highly enriched in (13)C be used. This may lead to memory effects which will be investigated in more detail. They occur when the component of the mixture to be investigated exhibits an isotope ratio which is different from that of the component eluted earlier from the column during the chromatographic separation process. A residue of this component, which is shown in the gas chromatogram as tailing, falsifies the result of the isotope ratio measurement. This also leads to false amount-of-substance measurement results. Memory effects can be avoided by using spikes of low (13)C content, by adjusting the composition of the reference solution to that of the sample, or by ensuring effective sample preparation, thus separating disturbing mixture components prior to the measurement. Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Quantification of glycopeptides by multiple reaction monitoring liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry

Protein glycosylation has a major influence on functions of proteins. Studies have shown that aberrations in glycosylation are indicative of disease conditions. This has prompted major research activities for comparative studies of glycoproteins in biological samples. Multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) is a highly sensitive technique which has been recently explored for quantitative proteomics. In this work, MRM was adopted for quantification of glycopeptides derived from both model glycoproteins and depleted human blood serum using glycan oxonium ions as transitions. The utilization of oxonium ions aids in identifying the different types of glycans bound to peptide backbones. MRM experiments were optimized by evaluating different parameters that have a major influence on quantification of glycopeptides, which include MRM time segments, number of transitions, and normalized collision energies. The results indicate that oxonium ions could be adopted for the characterization and quantification of glycopeptides in general, eliminating the need to select specific transitions for individual precursor ions. Also, the specificity increased with the number of transitions and a more sensitive analysis can be obtained by providing specific time segments. This approach can be applied to comparative and quantitative studies of glycopeptides in biological samples as illustrated for the case of depleted blood serum sample. Copyright ? 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Microwave-assisted derivatization procedures for gas chromatography/mass spectrometry analysis

In this review, published applications of microwave-assisted derivatization procedures for gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) are summarized. Among the broad range of analytical techniques available, GC/MS is still the method of choice for most high-throughput screening procedures in forensic/clinical toxicology, doping control and food and environmental analysis. Despite the many advantages of the GC/MS method, time-consuming derivatization steps are often required in order to obtain desirable chromatographic characteristics or to improve the stability and detectability of the target analytes. These derivatization processes typically require reaction times from 30 min up to several hours at elevated temperature. In contrast, microwave protocols have demonstrated to be able to reduce the time required for derivatization to a few minutes, and can thus very effectively shorten the overall analysis time, in particular when carried out in a high-throughput format. Herein, the literature in this field is summarized and recent experimental techniques for performing parallel GC/MS derivatization protocols are discussed.     

Isolation of bicarbonate from equine urine for isotope ratio mass spectrometry

Sodium bicarbonate administration to horses prior to competition in order to enhance the buffer capacity of the organism is considered as a doping offence. The analysis of the isotopic composition of urinary bicarbonate/CO(2) (TCO(2)) may help to identify an exogenous bicarbonate source, as technical sodium bicarbonate exhibits elevated delta(13)C values compared with urinary total carbon. The isolation of TCO(2) from 60 equine urine samples as BaCO(3) followed by an isotopic analysis shows a significant variability of delta(13)C for TCO(2) of more than 10 per thousand. The delta(13)C of total carbon and TCO(2) seem to reflect different proportions of C3 and C4 plant material in the diet. The isotopic analysis of different mixtures of technical NaHCO(3) and equine urine shows that TCO(2) can be easily isolated without major isotopic fractionation; however, attention has to be paid to the storage time of urine samples, as a shift of delta(13)C of TCO(2) to lower values may occur.     

Ultra trace determination of fluorobenzoic acids in reservoir and ground water using isotope dilution gas chromatography mass spectrometry

The accurate ultra-trace analysis of six fluorobenzoic acids (FBAs) via isotope dilution gas chromatography mass spectrometry through their deuterated analogues is described. North Sea reservoir and ground water samples were spiked with six deuterated FBAs (dFBAs), enriched using solid-phase extraction (SPE) and analysed using GC/MS after derivatisation with BF ₃· MeOH. All FBAs were enriched and determined simultaneously. SPE allowed a 250-fold enrichment of the acids if 100 mL of sample volume was used. The method enables the determination of FBAs down to the range of 8–37 ng L ^?1 with recoveries between 66 % and 85 %. It uses low amounts of chemicals and is adaptable to larger and smaller sample volumes.     

Determination of carbon isotope ratios of methanol and acetaldehyde in air samples by gas chromatography-isotope ratio mass spectrometry combined with headspace solid-phase microextraction

Isotopic signatures of atmospheric methanol and acetaldehyde have the potential to improve our ability to quantitatively assess their importance in atmospheric chemistry. However, isotopic measurements of atmospheric methanol and acetaldehyde and their individual source and sink processes have been limited. In this study, we examined gas chromatography-isotope ratio mass spectrometry combined with headspace solid-phase microextraction to measure the carbon isotope ratios of methanol and acetaldehyde in air samples. The method enabled us to determine carbon isotope ratios with a precision (1 standard deviation) of±0.6 ‰ for 20 ml of air sample containing more than 3 ppm of methanol and±0.7 ‰ for 20 ml of air sample containing more than 2 ppm of acetaldehyde. Moreover, the applicability of this method to determine isotope ratios of methanol and acetaldehyde emitted from detached plant leaves was demonstrated.     

Analysis of cyclic boronated and trimethylsilylated phenolalkylamines by gas chromatography and electron impact mass spectrometry

The side chain of phenolalkylamines containing a bifunctional group was derivatized as the cyclic boronate, and then the residual phenolic group was trimethylsilylated. The resulting derivatives were single reaction products in each case, with good gas chromatographic properties and informative mass spectra to afford prominent molecular ions by gas chromatography with electron impact mass spectrometry (GC/EI-MS). The cyclic boronated-trimethylsilylated derivatives yielded the isotope pattern for boron ((10)B:(11)B =-1:4.2) and characteristic ions [M](+), [M - H](+), [M - CH(3)](+), [M - RBO](+), [M - TMSO](+), and [M - TMSO - C(6)H(5)](+) ions in the mass spectra. In order to distinguish between m- and p-phenolalkylamines, the mass spectra of the cyclic phenylboronated-trimethylsilylated (PBA-TMS) derivatives were compared with those of the trimethylsilylated (TMS) derivatives. The TMS derivatives of octopamine (p-) and norfenefrine (m-) showed identical mass spectra, while the PBA-TMS derivatives had mass spectra sufficiently different from one other to distinguish between the isomers. The most prominent ion of the PBA-TMS derivative is the [M - H](+) ion (m/z 310) for octopamine and the [M](+) ion (m/z 311) for norfenefrine. Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The detection of nicotine in a Late Mayan period flask by gas chromatography and liquid chromatography mass spectrometry methods

Several ancient Mayan vessels from the Kislak Collection of the US Library of Congress were examined for the presence of alkaloids. One of them, a codex-style flask, bears a text that appears to read yo-'OTOT-ti 'u-MAY, spelling y-otoot 'u-may 'the home of its/his/her tobacco'. Samples extracted from this Late Classic period (600 to 900?AD) container were analyzed by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) and liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) methods. Nicotine was identified as the major component of the extracts. LC/MS analyses also yielded signals due to nicotine mono-oxides. The identities of the compounds were determined by comparison of the chromatographic and/or mass spectral characteristics with those from standards and literature data. High-resolution high mass accuracy tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) spectra of protonated nicotine and nicotine mono-oxides were measured to verify and to correct previous product ion assignments. These analyses provided positive evidence for nicotine from a Mayan vessel, indicating it as a likely holder of tobacco leafs. The result of this investigation is the first physical evidence of tobacco from a Mayan container, and only the second example where the vessel content recorded in a Mayan hieroglyphic text has been confirmed directly by chromatography/mass spectrometry trace analysis.