Advanced Techniques in Gas Chromatography–Mass Spectrometry (GC–MS–MS and GC–TOF–MS) for Environmental Chemistry

Acrylamide represents a processing contaminant, the presence of which was reported at increased amounts in starch-enriched food such as potato chips, French fries, roast potatoes, breakfast cereals, and crisp bread. polyacrylamide water treatment

Direct analysis of acrylamide in complex food matrices is not an easy task since the m/z 71 and 55 ions yielded by electron ionization (EI) fragmentation are of low value and nonspecific. Intensive chemical background noise at low m/z range does not allow obtaining low detection limit and adequate precision when using commonly available unit mass resolution instruments (in this context, bromination provides improved detectability of the analyte) .

Dunovska et al. developed a method for direct detection of acrylamide in food employing GC–HR-TOF-MS. Extraction by n-propanol followed by solvent exchange to MeCN avoided coisolation of acrylamide precursors (sugars and asparagine) that could yield additional analytes in the hot splitless GC injector.

Extensive reduction of matrix components in sample extracts, hence improvement of method robustness, was obtained by dispersive solid-phase extraction employing a primary–secondary amine sorbent. Isotopically labeled d3-acrylamide was employed for compensation of potential target analyte losses and/or matrix-inducted chromatographic response enhancement. Using a HR-TOF-MS instrument and using a narrow mass window setting (0.02 Da in this study), both acrylamide and d3-acrylamide (internal standard) were unequivocally identified by monitoring the ions at m/z 71.036 (55.018) and 74.056 (58.039), respectively (Figure 12). LOQ values obtained using this method were only slightly higher (15–40 μg/kg) compared to those attainable by GC–MS, which uses a laborious and time-consuming bromination step (2–25 μg/kg).polyacrylamide powder for sale