Evaluation of gas chromatography coupled with low pressure plasma source mass spectrometry for the screening of volatile organic compounds in food

A number of ion sources, namely low pressure helium MIPs, and low pressure helium and argon ICPs, coupled to GC and mass spectrometry have been evaluated for the analysis of volatile organic compounds. The most promising of these was the argon LP-ICP-MS. Detection limits of between 7-206 pg monitoring m/z 35 for 35 Cl detection, and between 92-7800 pg monitoring m/z 13 for 13 C detection, were obtained for a range of chlorinated and unchlorinated organic compounds. The potential for determining empirical formulae was demonstrated by an excellent correlation between predicted and measured Cl/C ratios. The technique was successfully used for the headspace analysis of chlorinated and unchlorinated volatile and semi-volatile compounds spiked into olive oil.