This article presents modified experimental protocols for dimethylmonothioarsinic acid (DMMTAV) and dimethyldithioarsinic acid (DMDTAV) synthesis, inducing dimethylarsinic acid (DMAV) thiolation through mixing of DMAV, Na2S, and H2SO4. The modified protocol provides an experimental guideline, thereby overcoming limitations of the synthesis steps that could have caused experimental failures in quantitative analysis.
Dimethylated thioarsenicals such as dimethylmonothioarsinic acid (DMMTAV) and dimethyldithioarsinic acid (DMDTAV), which are produced by the metabolic pathway of dimethylarsinic acid (DMAV) thiolation, have been recently found in the environment as well as human organs. DMMTAV and DMDTAV can be quantified to determine the ecological effects of dimethylated thioarsenicals and their stability in environmental media. The synthesis method for these compounds is unstandardized, making replicating previous studies challenging. Furthermore, there is a lack of information about storage techniques, including storage of compounds without species transformation. Moreover, because only limited information about synthesis methods is available, there may be experimental difficulties in synthesizing standard chemicals and performing quantitative analysis. The protocol presented herein provides a practically modified synthesis method for the dimethylated thioarsenicals, DMMTAV and DMDTAV, and will help in the quantification of species separation analysis using high performance liquid chromatography in conjunction with inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (HPLC-ICP-MS). The experimental steps of this procedure were modified by focusing on the preparation of chemical reagents, filtration methods, and storage.
Since dimethylarsinic acid (DMAV) has been demonstrated to exhibit both acute toxicity and genotoxicity due to undergoing methylation and thiolation upon ingestion1,2, the metabolic pathway of arsenic thiolation has been intensively studied both in vitro and in vivo3,4 as well as in environmental media (e.g., landfill leachate)5,6. Previous studies have found both reduced and thiolated analogs of DMAV in living cells, for example, dimethylarsinous acid (DMAIII), dimethylmonothioarsinic acid (DMMTAV), and dimethyldithioarsinic acid (DMDTAV)7,8,9, with dimethylated thioarsenicals such as DMMTAV exhibiting greater toxicity than other known inorganic or organic arsenicals10. The abundance of highly toxic thioarsenicals has serious environmental implications, since they may pose a risk to humans and the environment under highly sulfidic conditions11. However, the mechanisms of DMMTAV and DMDTAV (trans)formation and their fates in environmental media still require further study. Thus, the quantitative analysis of thioarsenicals is required to improve understanding of the environmental effects of DMMTAV and DMDTAV.
Although standard chemicals are the key requirement for quantitative analysis, the standards of DMMTAV and DMDTAV are difficult to obtain by replicating previous studies, owing to the high risk of species transformation into other species and unstandardized synthesis procedures12. Moreover, the methods referenced have limitations that may lead to practical difficulties in synthesizing the standard chemicals and performing quantitative analysis. DMMTAV and DMDTAV are commonly prepared by mixing DMAV, Na2S, and H2SO4 in a certain molar ratio1 or bubbling H2S gas through a solution of DMAV 13,14. The bubbling method features substitution of oxygen by sulfur using a direct supply of H2S gas, which, is highly toxic and difficult to control for an inexperienced user. Conversely, the above mixing method1, widely used for the qualitative analysis of DMMTAV and DMDTAV in environmental sudies5,6,12, features the thiolation of DMAV with H2S generated by mixing Na2S and H2SO4 and produces DMMTAV and DMDTAV, allowing easier stoichiometric control to produce target chemicals, as compared to the direct use of H2S gas.
The reference mixing method procedures1,3,4,8,15 mentioned in this study exhibit limitations in some of their critical experimental steps, which might lead to experimental failure. For example, the details of specific solvent (i.e., deionized water) preparation and the extraction and crystallization of the synthesized arsenicals are over-abbreviated or not described in sufficient detail. Such dispersed and limited information on procedural steps might lead to the inconsistent formation of thioarsenicals and unreliable quantification analysis. Therefore, the modified protocol developed herein describes the synthesis of DMMTAV and DMDTAV stock solutions with quantitative species separation analysis.
1. Synthesis of DMMTAV
2. Synthesis of DMDTAV
Since DMMTAV has been mistakenly prepared by the DMAIII synthesis method19, verification of synthesized DMMTAV and DMDTAV is a critical step for synthesis and extraction and determining the ideal standard chemical materials. Synthesized chemicals can be verified by the peak of DMMTAV (MW 154 g·mol-1) and DMDTAV (MW 170 g·mol-1) mass-to-charge ratio (m/z) using either the positive or negative ion mode of electrospray ionization-mass spectrometer (ESI-MS) through real-time injection. The reference values of m/z are listed in Table 119. Additional verification of the successful synthesis of DMMTAV and DMDTAV was conducted by comparing the species separation analysis results of the retention time (RT) of major peaks to reference data using HPLC-ICP-MS. Figure 1 shows similar RT of major and minor peaks, DMAV and DMMTAV (Figure 1a) or DMDTAV (Figure 1b), using 1.0 mL·min-1 of 5 mM formic acid as an eluent and a C18 Liquid Chromatography (LC) column as described in17. Note that the RT of the major peaks may vary depending on the instrumental and eluent conditions, and which LC column is used. Species included in the stock solutions of DMMTAV and DMDTAV should be examined prior to every analysis, although this protocol suggests storage conditions of 4 ˚C in the dark, which maintains synthesized DMMTAV and DMDTAV with, respectively, 2.2% and 5.8% transformation during the 13 weeks of analysis (Figure 2).
Figure 1: HPLC-ICP-MS chromatogram of the synthesized DMMTAV and DMDTAV. 1: DMAV, 2: DMDTAV, and 3: DMMTAV were measured as major peaks at 3.8 min, 5.9 min, and 8.0 min in each stock solutions of a: DMMTAV and b: DMDTAV, which were corresponded to those reported by Li et al. in 201017. Instrumental conditions of ICP-MS were 1550 V RF power and 50 µL injection volume. A C18 column was used with 5 mM formic acid as an eluent17. Please click here to view a larger version of this figure.
Figure 2: Stability of DMMTAV and DMDTAV at 4 ˚C in the dark. Percentage changes of As species distribution in each of the stock solutions DMMTAV (a) and DMDTAV (b) for 13 weeks. Please click here to view a larger version of this figure.
Synthesized stock solution | ion mode | Fragments | m/z | Riferimenti |
DMMTAV | Positive | [Me2As(SH)OH]+ | 155 | 13,14,19,17,21,24 |
[Me2As(OH)2]+ | 139 | 19,17 | ||
[Me2AsS]+ | 137 | 13,19,17,24 | ||
[Me2As(S)SAsMe2]+ | 275 | 13 | ||
Negative | [Me2AsOS]- | 153 | 17,5,23 | |
[MeAsSO]- | 138 | 17,5 | ||
[AsSO]- | 123 | 17,5 | ||
DMDTAV | Positive | [Me2As(SH)2]+ | 171 | 19,17 |
[Me2As(SH)OH]+ | 155 | 19 | ||
[Me2AsS]+ | 137 | 19,17 | ||
Negative | [Me2AsS2]- | 169 | 20,17,5,22 | |
[MeAsS2]- | 154 | 20,17,5 | ||
[AsS2]- | 139 | 17,5,22 |
Table 1: Suggested structure of synthesized DMMTAV and DMDTAV, and minor fragment ions by positive and/or negative ion mode of ESI-MS. The list of DMMTAV, DMDTAV, and minor fragments m/z measured by ESI-MS was reproduced from literature5,13,14,17,19,20,21,22,23,24. Note that m/z peaks may vary with instrumental conditions and/or matrices of the stock solutions.
The developed protocol has clarified critical steps that previous studies1,3,4,8,15 omitted or abbreviated, which may have led to difficulties with or failure during DMMTAV and DMDTAV synthesis. As DMMTAV is oxidation-sensitive1,5, chemical reagents for its synthesis were prepared using N2-purged deionized water (steps 1.1.1 – 1.1.3) to prevent the possible retardation of DMAV thiolation and the oxidation of DMMTAV. DMMTAV prepared using this protocol had a purity of 92%. The reference DMDTAV extraction method featured silica-based C18 column extraction with ammonium acetate or phosphate buffer solution as an eluent,3,4,7,8 with the purity of the thus prepared DMDTAV varying depending on the column compartments used, which is not described in references studies3,4,8. In contrast, the use of disposable SPE in the developed protocol (step 2.2.1) allowed the extraction of 88% pure DMDTAV. In addition, previous methods of crystallizing DMDTAV referenced only a freeze-drying procedure20, whereas in this protocol, simple drying of the extracted DMDTAV solution in an atmosphere of N2 inside the glove box (step 2.2.3) produced a white residue of crystalized dimethyldithioarsinate.
Identity verification of the synthesized DMMTAV and DMDTAV is a critical step for determining ideal standard chemical. In our previous work16 based on this protocol, major fragments at m/z 155 in the positive-ion mode and m/z 169 in the negative-ion mode were detected by ESI-MS analysis of as-synthesized DMMTAV and DMDTAV, respectively. The latter fragment was ascribed to [CH3]2AsS(=S)S]– (i.e., [M-H]–), in good agreement with previous results5,17,20,22, whereas the fragment at m/z 155 was assigned to [CH3]2As(=S)(OH) + H]+ (i.e., [M+H]+), again, in agreement with references13,14,17,19,21,24. Since ESI-MS analysis cannot be used as the only verification method, major peaks in the chromatograms of DMMTAV and DMDTAV stock solutions obtained by HPLC-ICP-MS were compared to those reported by Li et al.17 (Figure 1). Although DMAIII is known as an intermediate produced in the initial stage of DMMTAV formation1,7,8,25, it exhibits low stability, disappearing within 70 min19 and therefore is not detectable by this procedure (Figure 1).
Another goal of this study was to suggest storage conditions for DMMTAV and DMDTAV stock solutions with fewer impurities to prevent sulfide-to-oxide conversion and thus achieve greater stability18. The storage conditions used here (i.e., 4 ˚C in the dark) allowed the preservation of the synthesized DMMTAV and DMDTAV as major species in stock solutions (Figure 2) for four weeks, with no drastic decomposition observed even after 13 weeks. Although the solvent pH (i.e., that of deionized water) may affect the transformation of species during storage due to the presence of native10 and excess sulfide species originating from chemical reagents such as HS– or H2S, the stock solutions maintained neutral pH without significant transformation of the species contained therein (Figure 2). Therefore, stock solutions could be stored at 4 ˚C in the dark for 13 weeks prior to quantitative speciation analysis.
In this study, the reference molar ratio mixing method of synthesizing DMMTAV and DMDTAV 1,3,4,8,15 was modified to produce stable DMMTAV and DMDTAV stock solutions for HPLC-ICP-MS quantitative analysis. Due to a lack of critical step details, including not only chemical reagent preparation, extraction, and crystallization steps, but also the storage conditions of DMMTAV and DMDTAV, stock solutions had to be modified and optimized. Therefore, stock solutions prepared using this protocol are sufficiently applicable for quantitative analysis of DMMTAV and DMDTAV for environmental monitoring purposes.
The authors have nothing to disclose.
This research was supported by Basic Science Research program (Project number: 2016R1A2B4013467) through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Science, ICT & Future Planning 2016 and also supported by Korea Basic Science Institute Research Program (Project number: C36707).
Cacodylic acid | Sigma-Aldrich | 20835-10G-F | |
Sodium sulfide nonahydrate | Sigma-Aldrich | S2006-500G | |
Sulfuric acid 96% | J.T.Baker | 0000011478 | |
Ammonium acetate | Sigma-Aldrich | A7262-500G | |
Formic acid 98% | Wako Pure Chemical Industries, Ltd. | 066-00461 | |
Diethyl ether (Extra Pure) | Junsei Chemical | 33475-0380 | |
Adapter cap for 60 mL Bond Elut catridges | Agilent Technologies | 12131004 | Syringe type of SPE |
Bond Elut C18 cartridge | Agilent Technologies | 14256031 | Syringe type of SPE |
HyPURITY C-18 | Thermo Scientific | 22105-254630 | 5 um, 125 x 4.6 mm |
Glovebox | Chungae-chun, Rep. of Korea | Customized | |
Agilent 1260 Infinity Bio-inert LC | Agilent Technologies | DEAB600252, DEACH00245 | |
Agilent Technologies 7700 Series ICP-MS | Agilent Technologies | JP12031510 | |
Finnigan LCQ Deca XP MAX Mass Spectrometer System | Thermo Electron Corporation | LDM10627 |