Quantification of MDMB-4en-PINACA and ADB-BUTINACA in human hair by gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry.

PURPOSE: To test synthetic cannabinoid (SCs) in parent forms from living human, the hairs seems to be one of the best samples, because of the non-invasiveness upon their collection. The purpose of this study is to establish a method for quantification of MDMB-4en-PINACA and ADB-BUTINACA, the most recently abused SCs in hair samples, using gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (GC-MS/MS). METHODS: The collected hair samples were washed with a detergent solution, following by water and acetone. After drying cutting them into about 2 mm sections, they were ground by a cryogenic grinder into powder. The 50-mg powder with internal standard(s) plus 1 mL methanol were vortexed, and centrifuged to obtain the supernatant layer. After its evaporation and reconstitution with 50 µL methanol, 1-µL aliquot of it was subjected to analysis. RESULTS: The standard calibration curves were created for both MDMB-4en-PINACA and ADB-BUTINACA in blank hair samples; good linear curves were obtained in the range of 20-20,000 pg/mg with correlation coefficients greater than 0.99. The limits of detection and limits of quantification were 10 and 20 pg/mg, respectively. Other validation parameters were all satisfactory. The concentrations of MDMB-4en-PINACA obtained from 3 authentic subjects and ADB-BUTINACA obtained from 3 authentic subjects were 26.2-806 pg/mg and 63.1-430 pg/mg, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: In the present article, the details of simple and rapid quantification of MDMB-4en-PINACA and ADB-BUTINACA in human scalp hair have been established. To our knowledge, this is the first report for quantification of SCs in hair samples by GC-MS/MS.

Enhancement of lignocellulose-carbon nanotubes composites by lignocellulose grafting.

Lignocellulose (LNC) multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) composites were synthesized by covalently grafting a natural polymer, lignocellulose, onto MWCNTs in an ionic liquid, 1-allyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride (AmimCl). Furthermore, the grafting of LNC facilitated the dispersion of the MWCNTs in AmimCl and MWCNTs/LNC films. The elongation at break and tensile strength of grafted-MWCNTs/LNC films with 3wt% of MWCNTs content were 12.2% and 106.7MPa respectively, which was almost 93.7% and 10.7% higher than those of the pristine MWCNTs/LNC films. This finding clearly revealed that the mechanical properties of grafted-MWCNTs/LNC films were dramatically superior to those of the MWCNTs/LNC films.