Comparative studies of poly(dimethyl siloxanes) using automated GPC-MALDI-TOF MS and on-line GPC-ESI-TOF MS

In this study we compare on-line gel permeation chromatography (GPC) electrospray ionization (ESI) time-of-flight (TOF) mass spectrometry (MS) to automated GPC matrix assisted laser desorption ionization (MALDI) TOF MS for poly (dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) analysis. Average mass values for a hydroxyl-terminated PDMS (OH-PDMS) sample were obtained and compared to traditional GPC that was calibrated with narrow polystyrene standards, by direct ESI and MALDI MS analysis, by a summation of mass spectra of all GPC fractions, and also by the recalibration method determined by both mass spectrometric methods. Quantitatively, the difference noted here between these hyphenated techniques is that GPC-ESI-TOF MS effectively reports the low-mass oligomers and underestimates the high-mass oligomers, while GPC-MALDI-TOF MS effectively reports the high-mass oligomers and underestimates the low-mass oligomers. In the GPC-ESI-TOF MS experiments, ion current suppression was observed in the high molecular weight region. The suppression effect was confirmed by repeatable sample runs and by injecting different PDMS samples. Higher chromatographic resolution was observed for GPC-ESI-TOF MS compared to GPC-MALDI-TOF MS. In fact, truly mono-disperse oligomers were observed in the low molecular weight range from GPC-ESI MS experiments.