Challenges and Strategies of Chemical Analysis of Drugs of Abuse and Explosives by Mass Spectrometry
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REVIEW published: 18 January 2021 doi: 10.3389/fchem.2020.598487 Challenges and Strategies of Chemical Analysis of Drugs of Abuse and Explosives by Mass Spectrometry Ahsan Habib 1,2*, Lei Bi 1,3, Huanhuan Hong 1,3 and Luhong Wen 1,3* 1 The Research Institute of Advanced Technologies, Ningbo University, Ningbo, China, 2 Department of Chemistry, University of Dhaka, Dhaka, Bangladesh, 3 China Innovation Instrument Co., Ltd., Ningbo, China In analytical science, mass spectrometry (MS) is known as a “gold analytical tool” because of its unique character of providing the direct molecular structural information of the relevant analyte molecules. Therefore, MS technique has widely been used in all branches of chemistry along with in proteomics, metabolomics, genomics, lipidomics, environmental monitoring etc. Mass spectrometry-based methods are very much needed for fast and reliable detection and quantification of drugs of abuse and explosives in order Edited by: to provide fingerprint information for criminal investigation as well as for public security Mário Barroso, Portuguese National Institute of Legal and safety at public places, respectively. Most of the compounds exist as their neutral Medicine and Forensic form in nature except proteins, peptides, nucleic acids that are in ionic forms intrinsically. Sciences, Portugal In MS, ion source is the heart of the MS that is used for ionizing the electrically neutral Reviewed by: molecules. Performance of MS in terms of sensitivity and selectivity depends mainly on Hani Nasser Abdelhamid, Assiut University, Egypt the efficiency of the ionization source. Accordingly, much attention has been paid to Keyller Bastos Borges, develop efficient ion sources for a wide range of compounds. Unfortunately, none of Universidade Federal de São João del-Rei, Brazil the commercial ion sources can be used for ionization of different types of compounds. *Correspondence: Moreover, in MS, analyte molecules must be released into the gaseous phase and Ahsan Habib then ionize by using a suitable ion source for detection/quantification. Under these [email protected] circumstances, fabrication of new ambient ion source and ultrasonic cutter blade-based Luhong Wen [email protected] non-thermal and thermal desorption methods have been taken into account. In this paper, challenges and strategies of mass spectrometry analysis of the drugs of abuse Specialty section: and explosives through fabrication of ambient ionization sources and new desorption This article was submitted to Analytical Chemistry, methods for non-volatile compounds have been described. We will focus the literature a section of the journal progress mostly in the last decade and present our views for the future study. Frontiers in Chemistry Keywords: drugs of abuse, explosives, ambient ionization source, hollow cathode discharge ionization, headspace Received: 24 August 2020 method, non-thermal desorption, tribological effect, mechanism of ionization and desorption Accepted: 04 December 2020 Published: 18 January 2021 Citation: INTRODUCTION Habib A, Bi L, Hong H and Wen L (2021) Challenges and Strategies of Chemical Analysis of Drugs of Abuse Mass spectrometry (MS) is one of the most powerful and widely used modern physical-chemical and Explosives by Mass Spectrometry. methods for analyzing all types of compounds and most of the elements in the periodic table with Front. Chem. 8:598487. high selectivity and sensitivity. In analytical science, MS is known as a “gold standard” because of doi: 10.3389/fchem.2020.598487 its unique character of providing the direct molecular structural information of the compounds Frontiers in Chemistry | www.frontiersin.org 1 January 2021 | Volume 8 | Article 598487 Habib et al. Mass Spectrometry for Drugs/Explosives of interest. Therefore, MS technique has been widely used in for detection and quantification of the relevant analytes (Fenn all branches of chemistry along in proteomics, metabolomics, et al., 1989; Gale and Smith, 1993; McLuckey et al., 1996; genomics, lipidomics, environmental monitoring etc. and also in Feng and Smith, 2000; Byrdwell, 2001; Cody et al., 2005; technology. MS-based techniques have already been proven as a Shiea et al., 2005; Takáts et al., 2005; Hiraoka et al., 2006, versatile analytical tool for solving many analytical problems such 2007, 2015; Song and Cooks, 2006; Ganeev et al., 2007; Na as characterization of biomolecules such as proteins, peptides, et al., 2007a,b; Cotte-Rodríguez et al., 2008; Harper et al., 2008; nucleic acids and also analysis of polymers. MS has widely Zhang et al., 2009; Chen et al., 2010, 2017; Nilles et al., 2010; been used to elucidate the structure of the compounds of Garcia-Reyes et al., 2011; Takada et al., 2011; Habib et al., interest through fragmentation using tandem MS (MS2) as well. 2013, 2014, 2015, 2020; Sekar et al., 2013; Su et al., 2013; In fact, MS technique is the method of choice for industrial, Groeneveld et al., 2015; Castiglioni et al., 2016; Damon et al., clinical, biological, forensic, environmental monitoring, isotope 2016; Kumano et al., 2018; Tavares et al., 2018; Usmanov et al., etc. analyses. The development of the MS-imaging system is a 2018; Borges et al., 2019; Feider et al., 2019; Ng et al., 2019) and/or milestone to the scientific world because of its precise medical couple with a separation technique (chromatographic) such as diagnosis such as tumor, cancer etc. through characterization gas chromatography (GC), liquid chromatography (LC), high of complex biomolecules (Rohner et al., 2005; McDonnell and performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), electrophoresis, Heeren, 2007; Addie et al., 2015). paper chromatography etc. and then coupled with an ionization Furthermore, application of MS in space research that started source for ionization (Horning et al., 1974; Carroll et al., 1975; in the 1950’s by the US Naval Research Laboratory has already Alexandrov et al., 1984; Whitehouse et al., 1985; Olivares et al., been proven its high-throughput as an indispensable analytical 1987; Smith et al., 1988a,b; Lee et al., 1989; Covey and Devanand, tool in science and technology (Robert, 2008; Arkin et al., 2010). 2002; Sigman et al., 2006; Pizzolato et al., 2007; Khan et al., Mass spectrometry has been used by the International Space 2015; Gilbert-López et al., 2019). Mass spectrometer comprises Station for monitoring air quality, propellant leakage of the Space an ion source, mass analyzer and a detector. In MS, ion source Shuttles etc. (NASA, 2007). Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency is considered as the heart of it because the sensitivity mostly (JAXA) has already been taken a collaborative research with the depends on the ionization efficiency of the ion source. Since the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) to send the H3- discovery of MS in the 1950’s, electron ionization (EI) (Dempster, launch vehicle and the rover called as lunar polar exploration 1918, 1921), chemical ionization (CI) (Fales et al., 1972; Harrison, mission that for searching the existence of water to the south 1992; Field, 2002), fast atom bombardment (FAB) ionization pole region of the moon in 2024 (Hoshino et al., 2019, 2020; (Barber et al., 1981a,b, 1982), Panning ionization (Penning, The Yomiuri Shimbun, 2019). It is noted that the outstanding 1927; Arango et al., 2006; Hiraoka et al., 2006) were widely analytical performance of MS-based techniques facilitated us to used for ionization of the compounds of interest under vacuum achieve adequate knowledge and understanding about the solar condition. In the 1970s, Carroll and co-workers at the Baylor system as well as the universe. College of Medicine invented the atmospheric pressure chemical Applications of the MS technique should be emphasized ionization (APCI) (Horning et al., 1973) that was applied to into two general types: (i) detection and characterization of gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) (Carroll et al., compounds introduced into the MS where it can be considered 1975) and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) as a powerful detector and (ii) investigation of physical and/or (Horning et al., 1974). In 1975, a corona discharge electrode chemical transformations of the compounds being studied. In developed that has widely been used as an APCI ion source for the former case, MS couples directly with an ionization source commercially available MS system (Byrdwell, 2001). In the history of MS, development and application of electrospray ionization (ESI) opened a new research arena for the Abbreviations: MS, mass spectrometry; MS/MS, mass spectrometry/mass spectrometry; IMS, ion mobility spectrometry; GC, gas chromatography; LC, analysis of macromolecules and biological materials (Whitehouse liquid chromatography; HPLC, high performance liquid chromatography; GC- et al., 1985; Meng et al., 1988; Smith et al., 1988a, 1990; Fenn MS, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry; LC-MS, liquid chromatography- et al., 1989, 1990, 1997; Lee et al., 1989; Loo et al., 1990; Cole, mass spectrometry; HPLC-MS, high performance liquid chromatography- 1997; Kebarle, 2000). Electrospray ionization (ESI) is a technique mass spectrometry; MSE, microfluidic surface extractor; DBDI, dielectric that uses high voltage to generate ions from an aerosol of charged barrier discharge ionization; HCDI, hollow cathode discharge ionization; ac/dc-APCI-ac/dc, atmospheric pressure chemical ionization; ESI, electrospray liquid droplets. Since its first discover by Rayleigh (1882) for ionization; Nano-ESI, nano-electrospray