US EPA

2748837 

Journal Article 

Separation And Analysis Of Ethylenediamines As Their Tert.-butyl-dimethylsilyl Derivatives By Gas-Liquid Chromatography And Mass Spectrometry 

Ng L-K 

1984 

1 

Journal of Chromatography
ISSN: 0021-9673 

NIOSH/00143408 

314 

455-461 

Separation and analysis of ethylenediamine (107153) (EDA), diethylenetriamine (111400) (DTA), triethylenetetramine (112243) (TET), and tetraethylenepentamine (112572) (TEPA) by gas chromatography and mass spectrometry were described. The compounds were reacted with N-methyl-N-(tert-butyldimethylsilyl)trifluoroacetamide (I) to form their tert-butyldimethylsilyl (t-butyl) derivatives. A total of 100 microliters each of (I) and acetonitrile were added to 3 to 4 milligrams of a mixture of EDA, DTA, polyamine A, polyamine B, and mixture A. Polyamine A and polyamine B were commercial preparations containing TET and TEPA. Mixture A was a test mixture containing 10 percent EDA, 16 percent DTA, 21 percent polyamine A, and 53 percent polyamine B. After standing at room temperature for 30 minutes, aliquots of the reaction mixture were injected into a gas chromatograph interfaced to a mass spectrometer. The degree of silylation in each t-butyl derivative was determined from molecular weights. Retention times for the derivatives were determined. Molecular weights derived indicated that disilylated derivatives were predominantly formed. Less than 1 percent of the trisilylated derivative was formed in each case. Retention times for the di-t-butyl derivatives of EDA, DTA, TET, and TEPA were 5.25, 7.41, 9.37, and 11.41 minutes, respectively. The author concludes that one t-butyl group was attached to each of the primary amino groups of the compounds. Preparation of t-butyl derivatives of ethylenediamines is simple and rapid, and the derivatives are useful in gas chromatographic and mass spectrometric analyses.