Separation and identification of complex mixtures using chromatography mass spectrometry

• Main Author: Barks, Hannah Lynn
• Published: Georgia Institute of Technology 2010
• Subjects: Mass spectrometry; Photoexcitation; Purines; Nucleobases; DNA; RNA; Chromatography; Chromatographic analysis; Life Origin
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1853/33953

Here, for the first time, the formation of adenine, hypoxanthine, and guanine from formamide solutions with heating only to 130 degrees C and UV-irradiation in the absence of minerals or inorganic salts is shown using LC-MS/MS as the analysis technique. The thesis goes on to demonstrate that the product distributions change drastically when the temperature is increased to 160 degrees C from 130 degrees C, specifically that the amount of hypoxanthine increases with the addition of UV light, and the amount of adenine increases with an increase in temperature. Along with showing the formation of purines in these reactions, the identification of pyrimidines was also achieved by GCxGC-MS. GCxGC-MS was also used to study additional samples, specifically bio-oils, where the type of compounds in the samples were easily identifiable, which allowed for a direct comparison between different types of bio-oils (e.g. Douglas-fir bark, Southern pine bark, and a Southern pine bark-wood mixture).