Financial support is requested for acquisition of a mass selective detector to be used with an existing gas chromatograph. The resulting gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer combination would be used in structure determination of complex biological molecules in plant extracts. Applications in structure determination include studies of the complex carbohydrate portion of plasma membrane arabinogalatan-proteins and studies of possible non-amino acid constituents of oil body proteins. Applications in detection and quantitation include measurements of endogenous plant hormones in plants exposed to drought or chilling stress and in seeds during germination. These projects require capabilities of sensitive and quantitative chemical identification that cannot be achieved without a mass selective detector.
