A mass spectral study of cyclophosphamide concerning a thermally induced rearrangement reaction

The electron impact mass spectra of cyclophosphamide (1) are very sensitive towards experimental conditions in view of the kind of sample handling, the type of mass spectrometer used and the temperature of evaporation. The reason for this phenomenon is the elimination of HCl from the molecular ion by a specific 1,5-hydrogen transfer yielding an ion at m/z 224 which is structurally related to the bicyclic compound 4 with its typical fragment ions at m/z 175 and 147. Thermal excitation of the sample increases the intensity of this fragmentation pathway. The fragmentation pattern of 1 and the thermally induced rearrangement reaction has been elucidated by means of isotopic labelling, high-resolution data, metastable ion analysis and some tandem mass spectrometric experiments. Various samples of 1 monohydrate and its commercially available preparations, which are triturates with sodium chloride, differing in the crystal size distribution, showed nearly identical mass spectra on two different magnetic mass spectrometers, provided that the materials were introduced as solids under careful control of the evaporation temperature. The fragmentation via m/z 224 prevails in case of non-crystalline, pre-dissolved samples on one of the instruments used which might be explained by a differing construction of the ion source and the sample cup holder. The conclusions of Mruzek et al. concerning different proportions of stereoisomers in pharmaceutical preparations of 1 lack any analytical evidence.