Quadrupole ion trap mass spectrometry: a view at the turn of the century

A personal account of the quadrupole ion trap researches carried out in my laboratory and in collaboration with other laboratories. This account commences with the announcement, in 1983, of the first commercially available ion trap detector, manufactured by Finnigan MAT, and continues to the present day. Much of the ion trap mass spectrometry research that took place during the period following this announcement until 1994 has been discussed in detail in three volumes entitled Practical Aspects of Ion Trap Mass Spectrometry that were published in 1995. Except for those researches that impinged directly on our work during this period, no discussion of the contents of these three volumes is repeated here. The ion trap literature from 1994 to the present has been reviewed selectively so as to convey to the reader the dynamic nature of ion trap mass spectrometry and the wide variety of its application.     

Planar microchromatographic columns for gas chromatography

The adsorption and selective properties of aluminum-based planar microcolumns filled with the Carbopack B adsorbent are studied. The effect of geometrical parameters of the columns on their chromatographic properties is considered on an example of the separation of a mixture of light hydrocarbons. The advantages of planar microcolumns compared to conventional packed chromatographic columns are revealed.     

Planar chromatography for drug residue screening in food applications

Summary Planar chromatography (PC) is of interest for veterinary drug screening. An example is given of the use of a PC screening method followed by a high performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method for confirmation of positives. The results for 300 samples were obtained in 14 days whereas the HPLC analysis alone would have required 50 days work. The future of PC in veterinary drug residue analysis as a screening method and also as confirmatory (quantitative) method is discussed.     

Aflatoxin analysis at the beginning of the twenty-first century

Aflatoxin mycotoxins were first described in the early 1960s as important fungal toxins, which contaminate many different human foods and animal feeds. Accurate and sensitive determination of these carcinogenic compounds immediately became an important requirement to meet food safety concerns and new official legislated regulations. For these reasons, analytical methods for aflatoxins continued to develop over the decades, reflecting advances in analytical chemistry. Currently, a wide range of methods are available to analytical scientists, ranging from newly described multi-toxin liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry to rapid methods based on immunological principles. These latter methods can provide quantitative outputs or a simple rapid determination of contamination level above or below a pre-determined cutoff value. The newest official methods as validated by Association of Official Analytical Chemists International or Comité Européen de Normalisation rely on immunoaffinity column clean-up of conventional extracts, followed by high-performance liquid chromatography separation of the analogues with detection based on natural fluorescence or the fluorescence generated by various derivatisation methods. In selecting from this range of available methods, the analytical chemist must decide on the requirements of the analysis such that the method chosen is ‘fit for purpose’.     

Organometallic photochemistry at the end of its first century

The discovery of the light initiated reaction of Fe(CO)₅ to yield Fe₂(CO)₉ by Dewar and Jones in 1905 ushered in an era of the use of light to drive chemical reactions. This review seeks to examine selective chapters in this story by examining particularly significant reaction types in the context of their historical development.     

Planar electrochromatography Part 1. Planar electrochromatography on non-wetted thin-layers

Summary Planar electrochromatographic separations of test substances were performed on non pre-wetted, commercially available, thin-layer plates. The behavior of different layers and solvents was studied in an applied electric field of up to 2000 V cm^–1. Evident electrokinetic effects, electroosmosis and electrophoresis were observed only on silica gel and polyamide layers developed with polar solvents. The selectivity of separation of nonionic and ionogenic compounds was greatly enhanced. Although experimental conditions were controlled to a certain extent, results obtained with the same solvents were reproducible within 5%.     

Changes in the basic experimental parameters of capillary gas chromatography in the 20th century

Studies of qualitative changes in capillary gas chromatography are of significant practical and scientific interest. This paper analyzes the evolution of the most important experimental chromatographic parameters over the last three decades and is based on the use of a new approach to scientometrical research that is referred to as applied scientometry. One essential feature of this approach is that it looks at the entire contents of each paper rather than only taking account its title, abstract. and references (as is typical for conventional scientometry). In this paper, we monitor how the most important chromatographic parameters, such as column length and diameter, layer thickness, stationary liquid phases, separation temperature mode. etc., have been evolving over the period 1970-2000. We used data from the following journals: Chromatographia, Journal of Chromatography, and Journal of High Resolution Chromatography and Chromatography Communications.     

Organic mass spectrometry at the beginning of the 21st century

Mass spectrometry in the last 15–20 years has become one of the first methods of the qualitative analysis and quantitative determination of various substances, from isotopes of chemical elements to synthetic polymers, proteins, and nucleic acids. This method allows analysts to work with both individual compounds and most complex mixtures that contain hundreds and thousands of compounds. It is the best in terms of the sensitivity, information content, and rapidity. This review covers the present-day achievements of mass spectrometry, including ionization and ion separation methods and different versions of its application in various fields of science and human activity.     

Examination of the diterpenoic resin components of anatomical wax models from the eighteenth century by gas chromatography

Summary In literary sources of the 18th century the recipes for modelling wax suggest the addition of various resinous materials which serve as plasticisers and hardeners. The determination of such additives in case of the anatomical models created by Felice Fontana and Pietro Mascagni, which are displayed at the Josephinum in Vienna is presented in this paper. The identification of the resins was accomplished by comparison of the gas chromatographic pattern of diterpenoic resin esters. The addition of Venetian turpentine was verified. The degradation products of aged bees wax were identified by combined GC-FTIR-MS (gas chromatography — Fourier transform infrared spectrometry — mass spectrometry).     

Aluminium ions at polyelectrolyte interfaces. II. Role in the surface-area-exclusion chromatography of humic acid

Surface-area-exclusion chromatography using Whatman glass microfibre filters modified by adsorption of aluminium ions as a stationary phase was used to evidence the different interfacial behaviour of aluminium ion complexed (tritium labelled) humic acids. Histograms with adsorption peaks, plateaux and humps on the stationary phase showed the various adsorption characteristics of the modified humic acid. The absence of adsorption for those constituents which were recovered in the effluent showed the very low degrees of complexation by aluminium ions to be responsible for the absence of interaction of the components with the stationary phase. Received: 24 July 2000  Accepted: 20 December 2000