Rapid Screening, Identification of Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning Toxins in Red Tide Algae Using Hydrophilic Interaction Chromatography-High Resolution Mass Spectrometry with an Accurate-Mass Database

Abstract

A new method was developed for rapid screening and identification of paralytic shellfish poisoning(PSP) toxins in red tide algae by hydrophilic interaction chromatography-high resolution mass spectrometry(HILIC-HR-MS) combined with accurate mass database.Toxic algae sample was extracted with water containing 0.1 mol/L acetic acid after cell-breaking,and then the crude extracts were analyzed by HILIC-HR-MS in positive and negative full scan modes.The accurate mass of quasi-molecular ion and main fragment ion peaks of PSP toxins in toxic algae were acquired and the PSP toxins in algae could be successfully qualitative identification by database screening and HR-MS data analysis using commercial software(Mass Hunter).The created database includes data not only the accurate relative molecular masses of 25 common PSP toxins but also the fragment ions.The results showed that the proposed HILIC-HR-ESI/MS method was sensitive and had the high separation efficiency.The limits of detection(LOD) of ten common PSP compounds were in the range of 10-80 nmol/L,and it could meet the requirements for the actual screening of toxic algae samples.The developed method was applied to screen the PSP toxins in three kinds of toxic algae which demonstrated that the method was a useful tool for the rapid screening and qualitative identification of common PSP toxins in harmful algae.