Toward a better characterization of the aromatic and alicyclic components of marine dissolved organic matter: development and application of a one-step reduction reaction

University Of California-San Diego Scripps Inst Of Oceanography, La Jolla CA

Investigators

Abstract

Identifying the chemical structure of compounds that constitute the refractory dissolved organic matter (RDOM) reservoir will yield new insights into the processes that control the accumulation and removal of organic matter from aquatic environments. A scientist from Scripps Institute of Oceanography will be working to optimize an existing chemical reduction technique to render oxidized aliphatic and aromatic dissolved organic matter (DOM), two compounds which together comprise as much as 60% of the carbon in RDOM, more amenable to gas chromatography (GC) separation. This will allow for the characterization of this important RDOM component. Much of the time and effort associated with the proposed research will be invested in identifying backbone structures of reduction products. To assist with this structural characterization, the proposal also seeks to adapt and modify existing GC×GC time of flight mass spectrometry techniques to better separate the complex mixture of reduction products. In addition to enabling more accurate compound characterization, this technique will also allow a more rapid determination of structural homogeneity within aquatic DOM. As part of this proposal, a preparatory GC×GC will also be modified such that methods developed using the previous instrument can be easily applied to isolate relevant compounds for further characterization (including isotope measurements). This work will also generate an MS library the aliphatic and aromatic reduction products that will be made available to other investigators interested in pursuing a similar avenue of research. Besides continuing to further develop the analytical method, the researcher also plans to apply the method to test three hypothesis, namely (1) that reduction will yield several aromatic compounds, some of which resemble degraded lignin; (2) that reduction will yield a range of alicyclic compounds including terpane derivatives; and (3) that GC×GC separation will confirm the presence of structurally related families of aromatic and aliphatic compounds. Samples for this study include Suwannee River fulvic acids and natural organic matter, ultrafiltered DOM isolated from the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean and western tropical Atlantic Ocean, DOM isolated from Circumpolar Deep Water in the Southern Ocean isolated using Agilent Bondesil PPL, and one surface and one deep water sample collected in the North Pacific subtropical gyre obtained using reverse osmosis/electrodialysis that will serve as an ad-hoc marine, reference DOM. Analyses of these four different DOM sample types will help to determine reaction and GC/MS-based analysis parameters to be optimized for each sample type and compound class under study. The analytical method to be developed and the mass spectrometry library for reduction products would be of interest to the science community. One graduate student would be supported and trained as part of this project. Two high school summer interns chosen with the help of the Ocean Discovery Center would also participate in the study. Students from this program tend to be underrepresented minorities.