Off-flavor analysis in natural rubber by using HS-GC/MS/MS
MSTips No. 406
Natural rubber is used in a wide range of products from daily necessities such as shoe soles and hoses to industrial products such as tires. It is important to control off-flavor components in natural rubber, because the sap of natural rubber trees has a strong odor. In general, the SCAN/SIM measurement by HS-GC/MS is used for this analysis. However, it has possibility that the SIM measurement is affected by matrix components, because some natural rubbers contain many matrix components. Therefore, it is difficult to analyze off-flavor components contained in trace amounts by using the SIM measurement. On the other hand, the SRM measurement of GC/MS/MS use a combination of selected precursor ion and generated product ion from its selected precursor ion, so selectivity of detection ion and detection sensitivity will be improved. As a result, the influence of matrix components can be reduced, and it is possible to detect components contained in trace amounts. In this application, we report the analysis of off-flavor components in natural rubber by using HS-GC/MS/MS.