Molecular Mass Determination of Saturated Hydrocarbons Using Organometallic and Transition Metal Ion Chemistry

Published

January 1, 2003

Author(s)

H M. Byrd, Charles M. Guttman, S Robinson, D P. Ridge

Abstract

Saturated hydrocarbon polymers, polyethylene, polypropylene and their derivatives, are the most widely used of all synthetic polymers. Their chemical structure and composition, molecular mass (MM), and molecular?mass distribution (MMD) are critical in determining performance properties. The potential for quick and direct measurement of single-chain composition and MMD makes mass spectrometry (MS) especially attractive to the polymer industry. However, using MS analysis for the determination of MMDs requires the formation of intact macromolecular ions in the gas phase, which has proven quite difficult for saturated polyolefins due to the lack of a suitable ionizable site on the aliphatic chain. The present study demonstrates the feasibility of using eta- 5-cyclopentadienylcobalt ion (CpCo +) as cationization reagent for saturated hydrocarbon analysis.

Citation

ASMS Conference on Mass Spectrometry

Volume

79(7)

Pub Type

Journals

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Keywords

mass spectrometry, n-alkanes, organometallic ion chemistry

Citation

Byrd, H. , Guttman, C. , Robinson, S. and Ridge, D. (2003), Molecular Mass Determination of Saturated Hydrocarbons Using Organometallic and Transition Metal Ion Chemistry, ASMS Conference on Mass Spectrometry, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=852198 (Accessed October 17, 2025)