An investigation of micro-scale sealed vessel thermal extraction-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry MSSV-GC-MS/ and micro-scale sealed vessel pyrolysis-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry applied to a standard reference material of an urban dustrorgan

Sealed vessel thermal extraction and micro-scaled sealed vessel pyrolysis coupled to gas chromatography-mass spectrometry TH-GC-MS and MSSV-GC-MS. were qualitatively applied to a standard reference material of suspended urban dustrorganics NIST Standard Reference Material 1649.. Equal amounts of organic compounds and similar concentrations of the most volatile components were produced by both the thermal extract and MSSV techniques. However, the MSSV analyses show notably increased levels of semi-volatile compounds and a reduction in the unresolved complex mass UCM. related to the higher molecular weight heteropolymers of the particulate. The MSSV technique appears to be breaking down the more complex components that were previously intractable from the particulate substrate and in so doing release lower molecular weight compounds which may be used as a basis for characterising this component. In combination the thermal extraction and the MSSV pyrolysis provide an effective approach for the characterisation of PM10 organics.