Rapid isolation of biomarkers for compound specific radiocarbon dating using high-performance liquid chromatography and flow injection analysis–atmospheric pressure chemical ionisation mass spectrometry

Repeated semi-preparative normal-phase HPLC was performed to isolate selected biomarkers from sediment extracts for radiocarbon analysis. Flow injection analysis–mass spectrometry was used for rapid analysis of collected fractions to evaluate the separation procedure, taking only 1 min per fraction. In this way 100–1000 μg of glycerol dialkyl glycerol tetraethers, sterol fractions and chlorophyll-derived phytol were isolated from typically 100 g of marine sediment, i.e., in sufficient quantities for radiocarbon analysis, without significant carbon isotopic fractionation or contamination.