RAPID SCREENING OF VOLATILE COMPOUNDS IN PAPERBOARD USING STATIC HEADSPACE-SIFT-MS

Importance of the Topic

Paperboard packaging emits a wide variety of volatile organic compounds including terpenes, aldehydes, organic acids and reduced sulfur species. Effective screening of these volatiles is crucial for quality control in food, pharmaceutical and consumer goods packaging. Traditional chromatographic analyses require extensive sample preparation, derivatization and long run times, limiting throughput and increasing cost. SH-SIFT-MS offers a rapid, direct approach to detect and quantify trace-level volatiles without pre-concentration or complex sample handling.

Study Objectives and Overview

This application study demonstrates the use of static headspace coupled with selected ion flow tube mass spectrometry SH-SIFT-MS for the rapid analysis of volatile compounds in 11 paperboard samples. The aims were to evaluate analytical throughput, sensitivity across diverse compound classes, and the feasibility of routine screening in an industrial context.

Methodology and Instrumentation

Static headspace sampling was performed by incubating 1.3 g paperboard in 20 mL vials at 60 °C for 15 min. A 2.5 mL aliquot of headspace was introduced into the SIFT-MS inlet at 50 µL s⁻¹, maintaining a total flow of approximately 420 µL s⁻¹. Key elements included:

• A Voice200ultra SIFT-MS instrument with soft chemical ionization using reagent ions H₃O⁺, NO⁺, O₂⁺, O⁻, OH⁻, O₂⁻, NO₂⁻ and NO₃⁻
• Automated sampling with a GERSTEL MPS2 autosampler and Maestro software for scheduling incubation, injection and flushing to achieve throughputs above 12 samples per hour
• Quantification via Selected Ion Mode SIM and data processing in LabSyft software

Key Results and Discussion

SH-SIFT-MS enabled one-minute analyses per sample, detecting a wide range of volatiles from low-molecular weight acids to sulfur-containing compounds. Major findings included:

• High concentrations of methanol (up to 13 200 ppbv), hexanal (up to 3 900 ppbv), acetone and pentanal across samples
• Detection of short-chain fatty acids, reduced sulfur species (hydrogen sulfide, dimethyl trisulfide) and N-nitrosomorpholine at trace levels
• No need for derivatization or chromatographic separation, reducing analytical complexity

Benefits and Practical Applications

SH-SIFT-MS delivers significant advantages for industrial screening:

• Up to ten-fold faster throughput compared to static headspace GC-MS
• Broad compound coverage in a single run, including polar and thermally labile analytes
• Minimal sample preparation reduces cost and operator time

Future Trends and Potential Applications

Expanding SH-SIFT-MS to other packaging materials and process monitoring can further enhance quality assurance workflows. Integration with on-line sampling and real-time data analytics may enable continuous monitoring in production lines. Future developments may include library expansion for isomer discrimination and coupling with chemometric tools for pattern recognition.

Conclusion

Static headspace SIFT-MS offers a robust, high-throughput method for comprehensive volatile screening in paperboard. Its rapid analysis, broad selectivity and simplified workflow position it as an efficient tool for industrial quality control and research applications.

References

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