Effect of Cation Complexation of Hindered Phenol Antioxidants on their Fragmentation in Electrospray Ionization Tandem Mass Spectrometry

The fragmentation pattern of four hindered phenol antioxidants was investigated using ammonium and lithium ions as the additives for ionization. Due to different binding geometries and interactions, they underwent different characteristic fragmentation reactions providing useful complementary information for structural analysis of hindered phenol antioxidants. Ammonium ion adducts were fragmented successively until all t-butyl groups were lost in the form of isobutylene and allowed the estimation of the number of t-butyl groups present in the molecule. Lithium ion adducts produced fragment ions from major backbone cleavage, on the other hand, which provide more crucial information for the identification of detailed backbone structure.