Analysis of organic reactions by thin layer chromatography combined with matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry

✍ Scribed by Phaedria M. St. Hilaire; Laura Cipolla; Ulf Tedebark; Morten Meldal

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 203 KB
• Volume: 12
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0951-4198
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1097-0231(19981030)12:20<1475::aid-rcm365>3.0.co;2-f

✦ Synopsis

The products of a wide variety of organic reactions were rapidly identified by their masses through a combination of thin layer chromatography (TLC) and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-offlight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOFMS). Crude mixtures of peptides and glycopeptides, complex carbohydrate reactions, and a classical organic reaction were analysed using the following standard protocol. The components of the reaction mixtures were first separated on the TLC plate, scraped off, extracted and analysed by MALDI-TOFMS. The technique used is easy and applicable to most organic reactions, becoming a very powerful technique in reaction optimization once composition and identity of TLC spots have been established by MS. Moreover, the TLC/MALDI-TOFMS method was used to identify low molecular weight compounds with masses within the matrix region (100-500 u), a goal which is normally difficult to achieve. We successfully detected low molecular weight compounds by suppression of the matrix peaks using a relatively low matrix:analyte ratio (15:1 or lower). Doping both matrix and analyte solutions with [Cs] ions resulted in suppression of both [Na] and [K] peaks, thus enhancing the spectral signals and making identification of low molecular weight compounds more facile.