title: Liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry and high resolution mass spectrometry as analytical tools to characterize multi-class cytostatic compounds.
abstract: Cytostatic compounds used in the treatment of cancer have emerged as a new generation of water contaminants due to the continuous amounts administered to patients and to the fact that a variable proportion is excreted unchanged. In this study, we have evaluated the performance of liquid-chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) and high resolution mass spectrometry using an Orbitrap analyzer (LC-HRMS) for the multiresidue determination of multi-class cytostatic compounds. In a first step, ionization conditions were tested in positive electrospray mode and optimum fragmentation patterns were determined. For LC-MS/MS, two selected reaction monitoring (SRM) transitions were optimized and for LC-HRMS, the molecular ion with 5 ppm error and two product ions were defined. Following, the chromatographic conditions were optimized considering that compounds analyzed have a very different chemical structure and chromatographic behavior. The best performance was obtained with a Luna C18 column, which permitted the separation of the 26 compounds in 15 min. Finally, the performance of LC-MS/MS and LC-HRMS was compared in terms of linearity, sensitivity, intra and inter-day precision and overall robustness. While LC-MS/MS provided good identification capabilities due to selective SRM transitions, LC-Orbitrap proved to be 100 times more sensitive. This study provides a comprehensive overview on the MS conditions to determine the outmost used cytostatic compounds and provides a spectral library to be used for the identification of these compounds in water or biological matrices.
authors: Department of Environmental Chemistry, IDAEA-CSIC, Jordi Girona 18-26, 08034 Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain.
authors: Cristian
authors: C
authors: Gómez-Canela
authors: Nuria
authors: N
authors: Cortés-Francisco
authors: Francesc
authors: F
authors: Ventura
authors: Josep
authors: J
authors: Caixach
authors: Silvia
authors: S
authors: Lacorte
mesh_terms: D000970:Antineoplastic Agents / Q000032:analysis*; D002853:Chromatography, Liquid / Q000379:methods*; D053719:Tandem Mass Spectrometry / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D000970:Antineoplastic Agents