This grant has provided the Department of Biology a Hewlett-Packard capillary gas chromatograph (GC) linked to a mass spectrometer (MS) with a direct insertion probe that is being used to facilitate instruction in Toxocology courses and to facilitate the development of more interdisciplinary undergraduate science projects. Since the MS is an essential tool in the qualitative and quantitative structural analysis of unknown toxicants in the environment, projects have been designed in six courses to teach how the GC/MS functions, and how it is used in Toxicology and in other areas of the Biological and Physical Sciences. Experiments have been developed to exploit the advantages offered by the GC/MS as well as show the disadvantages of inappropriate use (e.g. unstable antibiotics injected into a GC/MS versus direct insertion into the MS). Student projects involve the use of the GC/MS to detect environmental pollutants and unknown metabolites of well-defined toxic chemicals or medications. Stable isotope analyses, potentially useful to those pursuing human nutritional toxicology research, and experiences with new methods for using the GC/MS (e.g. with theoretical, pure standards and with biological sample spectra) are providing instruction on uses of a low resolution GC/MS in Toxicology.
