Tracking Neutral Nitrogen Compounds in Subfractions of Crude Oil Obtained by Liquid Chromatography Separation Using Negative-Ion Electrospray Ionization Fourier Transform Ion Cyclotron Resonance Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

Neutral nitrogen compounds have been used as molecular markers for tracking secondary oil migration in geochemistry. However, the distribution of neutral nitrogen compounds in the separation process is not well-characterized because the conventional analytical technique, such as gas chromatography−mass spectrometry (GC−MS), is non-selective for neutral nitrogen and not capable of detecting non-volatile high-molecular-weight compounds. In this paper, a crude oil was subjected to the traditional two-step open-column liquid chromatography (LC) technique to prepare subfractions, which were characterized for their molecular composition of neutral nitrogen compounds by negative-ion electrospray ionization Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (ESI FT-ICR MS). The results showed that the two-step LC technique produced a low yield of carbazole in the neutral nitrogen fraction. The neutral nitrogen fraction was enriched with low-molecular-weight neutral nitrogen compounds. Most N1 class speci...