2-Butenoic acid, a chemical marker for poly-β-hydroxybutyrate identified by pyrolysis—gas chromatography / mass spectrometry in analyses of whole microbial cells

Compositional analysis of poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyvalerate) by pyrolysis-gas chromatography in the presence of organic alkali

“…Provided that these intermediates are considerably generated under the given pyrolysis conditions around 350 8C and further subjected to online hydrolysis and methylation in the presence of TMAH at the adjacent ester linkage, methyl 3-butenoate should be formed from (I), while cis-and trans-isomers of methyl 2-butenoate from (II) and (III). Furthermore, the relative yields among methyl butenoate isomers observed are consistent with the previous reports describing that the major product by ordinary pyrolysis of PHB was trans-2-butenoic acid together with small amounts of cis-2-butenoic acid and 3-butenoic acid [8][9][10][11]18] mainly because of steric hindrance during ciselimination [10,23].…”

“…0.1 mg or less) of the samples [7]. So far, thermal degradation mechanisms of biodegradable aliphatic polyesters such as PHB [8][9][10][11][12][13], poly(lactic acid) [12,14,15], and poly(e-caprolactone) (PCL) [12] have been investigated by Py-GC. In addition, biodegradation behaviors of the polyesters have been also studied by Py-GC [16,17].…”

Novel biomarkers for Gram-type differentiation of bacteria by pyrolysis–gas chromatography–mass spectrometry

“…Pyrolysis products of cytosol components such as nucleic acids and proteins are composed of very similar compounds, and although used for pyrolytic typing of different strains, these thermally generated molecules do not provide enough biomarker information to distinguish bacterial species or even to differentiate between prokaryotic and eukaryotic organisms. However, pyrolysis products derived from carbohydrates, lipids and other components, e.g., dipicolinic [6,7] or poly(3-hydroxyalkanoic) acids [8], have been widely utilized for bacterial discrimination due to their substantial discriminative power.…”

Chemical markers for bacteria in extraterrestrial samples

“…Unfortunately, pyr results in a complex series of reactions, including scission, rearrangement, and dehydration of chemical bonds. Thus it is often difficult to relate the structure of pyr products to the parent molecules present in bacteria and other life forms (Simmonds, 1970;Eudy et al, 1985;Smith et al, 1987;Watt et al, 1991;Knabner-Kögel, 2000).…”