title: Direct determination of levoglucosan at the picogram per milliliter level in Antarctic ice by high-performance liquid chromatography/electrospray ionization triple quadrupole mass spectrometry.
abstract: A method for the direct determination of levoglucosan at the picogram per milliliter level in less than 1 mL of Antarctic ice has been developed. Chemical analysis is performed by high-performance liquid chromatography with triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometric detection. Levoglucosan, a specific molecular marker for biomass burning, is identified by negative ion electrospray mass spectrometry using m/z 161/113, 161/101, 161/85, and 161/71 as monitoring ion transitions. Contamination problems were carefully taken into account by adopting ultraclean procedures during sampling and sample pretreatment phases. The limit of detection is 3 pg mL(-1) (0.3 pg absolute amount injected); the repeatability ranges between 20% and 50% at a concentration of 20 and 9 pg mL(-1), respectively. This methodology allowed the direct determination of levoglucosan in a 1 mL sample of Antarctic ice with concentration ranges between 4 and 30 pg mL(-1). To our knowledge these are the first levoglucosan concentrations reported for Antarctic ice.
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Venice, Ca' Foscari, 30123 Venice, Italy. gambaro@unive.it
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Gambaro
authors.forename: Roberta
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Zangrando
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gabrielli
authors.forename: Carlo
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Barbante
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Cescon
mesh_terms: D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000737:chemistry; D000864:Antarctic Regions; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid / Q000379:methods*; D005947:Glucose / Q000031:analogs & derivatives* / Q000737:chemistry; D007053:Ice / Q000032:analysis*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D021241:Spectrometry, Mass, Electrospray Ionization / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D000393:Air Pollutants; D007053:Ice; C014989:1,6-anhydro-beta-glucopyranose; D005947:Glucose