Electrospray ionization mass spectrometry of organogermanium compounds

A detailed study of the solution chemistry and mass spectrometry of six car boxylato-organogermanium compounds in aqueous solution has been carried out using electrospray ionization and MSn techniques. The different types of h ydrolysis products and their probable structures, which include the oligome rs and their fragment ions plus water adduct ions formed by ion-molecule re actions, are presented, e.g., HO-cyclic-(-Ge(O-)CH2CH2COO) A, HO-cyclic-(-G e(O-cyclic-(Ge(O-)CH2CH2COO CH2CH2COO) B, -OGeO-cyclic-(-Ge(OH)CH2CH2COO) C , and -CH=CHGeO-cyclic-(-Ge(OH) CH2CH2COO) D, etc. The proposed cyclic stru ctures are confirmed by theoretical calculations. Copyright (C) 2001 John W iley & Sons, Ltd.