Citation:

Budde, W L. ANALYTICAL MASS SPECTROMETRY OF HERBICIDES. MASS SPECTROMETRY REVIEWS 23(1):1-24, (2004).

Impact/Purpose:

The purpose of this research project is to develop a strong qualitative and quantitative "gold standard" laboratory reference analytical method for the simultaneous selective and sensitive identification and measurement of those cyanobacteria toxins that are of the highest priority to EPA and state and local drinking water authorities. These toxins are on the drinking water candidate contaminant list (CCL), but the specific toxins that are the most likely to occur, and which are the potentially most hazardous, are not defined on the CCL. Six toxins were recommended for highest consideration by an EPA workshop in May, 2001. These are the alkaloids anatoxin-a and cylindospermopsin, and the four microcystins abbreviated RR, LR, YR , and LA (these characters are the standard single-character designations for four natural aminoacids). There are no published analytical methods that have been demonstrated to have the ability to detect and reliably measure the concentrations of these six compounds in a single drinking or source water sample. The purpose of this research is to not only develop and demonstrate this capability with real environmental samples, but also to do it in a single economical laboratory analytical method that requires about one hour from initial sample preparation to obtaining the results. It is expected that some other toxins will be found in the real environmental samples tested, and perhaps even new toxins may be discovered in this work. The techniques employed in this work, have the capability of tentatively identifying known and unknown toxins even when standards are not available.

Description:

Herbicides are chemical substances that are applied to agricultural soils, gardens, lawns, or plants to destroy or to prevent the growth of undesirable vegetation. The herbicides included in this review are generally syntehtic organic compuonds that are ingredients in commercial herbicide products that were designated active during late 2002 in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's database of registered and canceled pesticide products. The compounds are organized into 21 categories according to their general chemical structures or a common structural group. The herbicides in each category are discussed in terms of their structures, their database electron ionization mass spectra, their amenability to separation and measurement with gas chromatography, reverse phase liquid chromatography, and capillary electrophoresis combined with mass spectrometry. Ionization techniques ocnsidered are mainly electron ionization, electropray, and atmospheric pressure chemical ionization. Sixty-six references are provided to herbicide reviews, and to the recent herbicide analytical chemistry and mass spectrometry research literature.

Record Details: