Analysis of volatile organic compounds using cryogen-free thermal modulation based comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography coupled with quadrupole mass spectrometry.

A single-channel comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography-quadrupole mass spectrometry (GCxGC-qMS) system was developed using a recently introduced solid-state thermal modulator. By modulation on a special column, extremely light hydrocarbons down to C2 can be successfully modulated without use of any cryogens. Paired with a polar secondary dimension column, a hybrid primary dimension column was developed to provide complete two-dimensional separation of all target volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from C2 to C12. This single-channel GCxGC-qMS system is used to analyze VOC standards containing 57 PAMS and 64 TO-15 gas mixtures, as well as real-world samples. This study demonstrates that a low resource GCxGC-qMS system may serve as a feasible tool for routine VOCs monitoring.