Gas chromatography with dual mass spectrometric and nitrogen-phosphorus specific detection: a new and powerful tool for forensic analyses

Mass spectrometry in combination with gas chromatography (GC-MS) is nowaday s state of the art for searching, confirmation and quantitation in the fiel d of forensic analytics. With the aid of mass spectral libraries, unknown s ubstances can be easily identified. Many forensic laboratories use a separa te instrument with specific detectors like the nitrogen-phosphorus specific detector (NPD) for the search of general unknowns, involving absolute or r elative retention indices. To our knowledge, no publications with both MS a nd NPD on the same instrument exist for forensic analyses. By the adaptatio n of the lengths of the analytical columns, differences in the absolute ret ention times could be minimized to fractions of a minute. We would like to present a technical improvement to combine and further enhance the analytic al possibilities of two modem analytical techniques in the field of forensi c analyses. Examples are presented from routine work: Analysis of an illici t powder suspected to contain drugs of abuse and a toxicological screening for basic drugs in human blood. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.