Chromatographic Analysis of Byproducts from a Non-Toxic Ammunition and a Marked Ammunition: An Assessment of Toxicity

Abstract

One way to access the toxicity of a fired ammunition is by analyzing the byproducts generated by shooting. This work has analyzed compounds produced by firing non-toxic ammunition (NTA) by Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS). In addition to standard NTA, NTA containing luminescent markers were also analyzed. Luminescent markers have been shown to be an excellent tool in the identification of Gunshot Residues (GSR) produced from NTA. As these markers are designed to tag NTA, they must not produce toxic byproducts. In this work, we focused on identification of volatile products that can be inhaled by shooter when firing and can represents risk to their heath by acute and chronic exposition. For the NTA ammunition several toxic compounds, such as benzonitrile and naphthalene were found. They were related to de degradation of explosives, sensitizers, stabilizers, and other materials added to the gunpowder, indicating possible toxicity by shooters’ long exposure. Moreover, as some of the compounds found are classified as GSR indicators, the used methodology could be adapted for GSR identification. Besides the compounds identified in NTA samples, in marked samples, pyridine and benzene were identified. Pyridine was provided by dipicolinic acid and benzene was provided by trimesic or terephthalic acid, all used as binder in the structures of the markers. However, it can be concluded that the possible toxicity of the NTA is mainly not altered by the presence of the markers because of the small amount of marker added to ammunition and because only a small part of the marker is degraded, requiring an unreal number of shots to produce some acute effect.