2015/11/05 by Julie E. M. McGeoch, Malcolm W. McGeoch · 2 citations
Environmental Science · Chemistry · #Isotope Analysis in Ecology #Mass Spectrometry Techniques and Applications #Analytical Chemistry and Chromatography
paper · pdf · doi:10.1111/maps.12558
openalex publication_date 2015/11/05 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
Abstract It has been proposed that exothermic gas phase polymerization of amino acids can occur in the conditions of a warm dense molecular cloud to form hydrophobic polymer amide ( HPA ) (McGeoch and McGeoch 2014). In a search for evidence of this presolar chemistry Allende and Murchison meteorites and a volcano control were diamond burr‐etched and Folch extracted for potential HPA yielding 85 unique peaks in the meteorite samples via matrix‐assisted laser desorption time‐of‐flight mass spectrometry ( MALDI TOF / MS ). The amino acids after acid hydrolysis in Allende were below the level of detection but many of the Allende peaks via the more sensitive MALDI / TOF analysis could be fitted to a polymer combination of glycine, alanine, and alpha‐hydroxyglycine with high statistical significance. A similar significant fit using these three amino acids could not be applied to the Murchison data indicating more complex polymer chemistry.