Quantitative analysis of aliphatic amines in urban aerosols based on online derivatization and high performance liquid chromatography

Abstract

A method combining online derivatization with high performance liquid chromatography/fluorescence detection was developed for the determination of seven aliphatic amines (ethanolamine, methylamine, ethylamine, propylamine, butylamine, pentylamine and hexylamine) in urban aerosols. The collected amines were online derivatized with o-phthalaldehyde to form highly fluorescent sulfonatoisoindole derivatives. The derivatives were completely separated in 13 min through gradient elution and detected by fluorescence detection at an excitation wavelength of 334 nm and an emission wavelength of 443 nm. Under the optimized conditions, the relative standard derivations (RSDs) of all detected amines were 0.02-2.03% and 1.04-1.52% for the retention time and peak area, respectively. Excellent linearity was achieved for each analyte, ranging from 5 μg L(-1) to 1000 μg L(-1) (R(2) > 0.99). The detection limits for all analytes were below 1.1 μg L(-1). The proposed method was used to analyze aliphatic amines in 35 samples of urban PM2.5 collected in Shanghai and was found to be suitable for the determination of particulate aliphatic amines at ng m(-3) levels in ambient air. Based on our measurements, ethanolamine and methylamine were the most abundant species on average in Shanghai during dry and wet seasons. The highest concentration was 15.3 ng m(-3) for ethanolamine and 13.2 ng m(-3) for methylamine.

Characteristics and sources of aerosol aminiums over the eastern coast of China: insights from the integrated observations in a coastal city, adjacent island and surrounding marginal seas

“…Thus, the negative correlations may be explained by the movement of gas-particle partitioning equilibrium to the gas phase at higher temperatures (Ge et al, 2011a). This is consistent with the previous observation that the proportion of particles containing aminiums in the urban area of Shanghai was much higher in winter (23.4 %) than in summer (4.4 %) (Huang et al, 2012). The seasonal variation in temperature may also lead to the change of concentrations of aerosol aminiums.…”

“…Although the lifetime of gaseous amines in the atmosphere is only a few hours, it can be prolonged after amines partition into the particle phase, and thus they may be transported over a long range (Nielsen et al, 2012). Many studies have been done on the gas and/or particle phases of amines over eastern China and adjacent seas (Huang et al, 2012(Huang et al, , 2016Hu et al, 2015;Zheng et al, 2015;Tao et al, 2016;Yu et al, 2016;Shen et al, 2017;Xie et al, 2018;Yao et al, 2016Yao et al, , 2018. For example, C1 to C6 amines over Shanghai were measured during the summer of 2015, of which C1, C2 and C4 amines were the dominant species with average concentrations of 15.7, 40.0 and 15.4 ppt, respectively .…”

C1-C2 alkyl aminiums in urban aerosols: Insights from ambient and fuel combustion emission measurements in the Yangtze River Delta region of China

“…Being potential source area, heavily polluted urban regions are recently becoming hotspots of NPF studies (Herrmann et al, 2014;Kanawade et al, 2014;Kulmala et al, 2016;Nie et al, 2014;Stanier et al, 2004;Wang et al, 2014Wang et al, , 2015Xiao et al, 2015;Yu et al, 2016a). There are just a few measurements of particle-phase amine in urban aerosols around the world (Huang et al, 2014(Huang et al, , 2016Tao et al, 2015;VandenBoer et al, 2011;Yang et al, 2005;Youn et al, 2015;Zhang et al, 2002). The measurements on amine emissions from fuel combustion sources are even scarcer.…”

Characterization of organic aerosol in Beijing by laser desorption ionization coupled with Fourier Transform Ion Cyclotron Resonance Mass spectrometry

“…Light absorption properties of organic aerosols are easily influenced by the aromatic ring compounds (Laskin et al, 2009a) which may induce further photochemical reactions. A small amount of the nitrogen containing species locate in the low DBE value region, which means this small amount of compounds are highly saturated and most likely to have long alkyl chains in their formula, these nitrogen containing saturated compounds may be aliphatic amines and amides which are derivatives of the incomplete combustion of the product of the amino acids (Ge et al, 2011;Huang et al, 2016;Zhang and Anastasio, 2003) or nitriles which derived from biomass burning and secondary reaction (Laskin et al, 2009b;€ Ozel et al, 2010). By comparing Fig.…”

“…Organic amine heterogeneous chemical reactions can occur on the surface of the organic aerosols and thus influence the formation of second aerosols (Angelino et al, 2001;Huang et al, 2016;Tang et al, 2013). What's more, like organosulfates, this kind of compounds consists of both hydrophilic and hydrophobic functional groups.…”