Screening and characterization of atrazine metabolites by liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry

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Abstract
The ability of liquid chromatography combined with positive‐ion low‐collision‐energy tandem mass spectrometry for screening and characterization of atrazine metabolites in aqueous solutions is examined. The strategy used was defined after investigations on the structure and origin of the main daughter ions through experiments done by desorption chemical ionization with NH3 or ND3 as reagent gas. Following this, a three‐step procedure was proposed which included parent‐ion spectra based on [XCNC(NH)NH2]+ (with X  Cl or OH) ions apparently formed via ion‐dipole complexes and found to be highly diagnostic for chlorotriazines and hydroxytriazines respectively.