CHARACTERIZATION OF ALKYL-TINS AND ARYL-TINS BY MEANS OF ELECTROSPRAYMASS-SPECTROMETRY

The organotins, mainly the trialkyltins and triphenyltins, have a wide spread application as fungicides, anti-fouling coatings for porous and non-porous surfaces, herbicides, insecticides, and generic biocides. Traditional environmental monitoring methods can only give limited spe ciation of the organometallics. The speciation of a wide variety of al kyl- and aryl-tin isomers using liquid chromatography coupled with mas s spectrometry under positive-ionization conditions is reported. Detec tion of the organotins was enhanced by the use of acetic acid in the m ethanol mobile phase. There were unexpected high-mass ions with multip le tin-isotope patterns present in many of the spectra. These high-mas s species were possibly attributable to tin polymers, whose presence h as been observed by others using X-ray methods.