Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry Analysis of Synthetic Opioids Belonging to the Fentanyl Class: A Review

Abstract

The rising number of deaths caused by fentanyl overdosing in the US due to the overwhelming illicit use of this synthetic opioid has started a global campaign to develop efficient ways to control its production and distribution as well as discovering efficient antidotes to mitigate its lethal effects. Another important vein of focused research established by various agencies lies in the development of efficient and practical protocols for the detection of this opioid and analogs thereof in various matrices, whether environmental or biological in nature, particularly in the field of gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The following review will cover the literature dealing with the detection and identification of synthetic opioids belonging to the fentanyl class by GC-MS means and hyphenated versions of the technique. Detailed descriptions will be given for the GC-MS methods employed for the analysis of the opioid, starting with the nature of the extraction protocol employed prior to analysis to the actual findings presented by the cited reports. Great effort has gone into describing the methods involved in each paper in a detailed manner and these have been compiled by year in tables at the end of each section for the reader's convenience. Lastly, the review will end with concluding remarks about the state of GC-MS analysis with regards to these powerful opioids and what lies ahead for this analytical field.

Characterization of fentanyl HCl powder prior to and after systematic degradation

“…Thus, previous research used extensive methods to prepare the samples or force breakdown products for detection using gas chromatography. For example, to identify fentanyl in body fluids, solid phase extraction is commonly used [4].…”

High-Precision Automatic Identification of Fentanyl-Related Drugs by Terahertz Spectroscopy with Molecular Dynamics Simulation and Spectral Similarity Mapping

“…The fundamental strategy to address this crisis is to develop fentanyl detection technology. To date, the most commonly used method to identify fentanyl and its analogs are chromatography–mass spectrometry, such as gas chromatography–mass spectrometry [ 15 , 16 ], liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry [ 17 , 18 ], and liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry [ 19 , 20 ]. Although these methods are accurate and sensitive, they cannot meet the increasing requirements for rapid detection (e.g., in situ and street detection) due to their time-consuming processing procedures conducted in the laboratory [ 21 ].…”

Development and evaluation of a synthetic opioid targeted gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC‐MS) method

“…Since GC-MS is an extensively used technique for fentanyl analysis [30], developing tools and methods using this platform could allow for adoption by a large number of laboratories. Much of the recent work that has been method-based has focused on small subsets of compounds [31] or has been toxicology focused [32,33].…”