title: Improved protonation, collision-induced decomposition efficiency and structural assessment for 'red tide' brevetoxins employing nanoelectrospray mass spectrometry.
abstract: Brevetoxins are a group of natural neurotoxins found in blooms of red tide algae. Previous electrospray mass spectrometry (ES-MS) studies show that all brevetoxins have high affinities for sodium ions, and they form abundant sodium adduct ions, [M + Na]+, in ES-MS, even when trace contamination is the only source of sodium ions. Attempts to obtain informative product ions from the collision-induced decomposition (CID) of [M + Na]+ brevetoxin precursor ions resulted only in uninformative sodium ion signals, even under elevated collision energies. In this study, a nano-ES-MS approach was developed wherein ammonium fluoride was used to form cationic [M + NH4]+ adducts of brevetoxin-2 and brevetoxin-3; a significant increase in the abundance of protonated brevetoxin molecules [M + H]+ also resulted, whereas the abundance of sodium adducts of brevetoxins [M + Na]+ was observed to decrease. Under CID, both [M + NH4]+ and [M + H]+ gave similar, abundant product ions and thus underwent the same types of fragmentation. This indicated that ammonium ions initially attached to brevetoxins forming [M + NH4]+ easily lose neutral ammonia in a first step in the gas phase, leaving protonated brevetoxin [M + H]+ to readily undergo further fragmentation under CID.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University of New Orleans, 2000 Lakeshore Drive, New Orleans, LA 70148, USA.
authors.forename: Weiqun
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Richard B
authors.initials: RB
authors.lastname: Cole
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D004141:Dinoflagellida / Q000737:chemistry*; D007202:Indicators and Reagents; D008387:Marine Toxins / Q000032:analysis*; D035964:Oxocins / Q000032:analysis*; D011522:Protons; D012997:Solvents; D021241:Spectrometry, Mass, Electrospray Ionization; D000095702:Polyether Toxins
chemical_list: D007202:Indicators and Reagents; D008387:Marine Toxins; D035964:Oxocins; D011522:Protons; D012997:Solvents; C053342:brevetoxin; D000095702:Polyether Toxins