Hi,

My name is Guru. I am a graduate student at
Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada. I am
working on the analysis of estrogens from
biological tissues using GC-MS. Estrone and
Ethnylestradiol are included in my analyte list.I
have some problem regarding the derivatization of
these steroids for which i request help/sugesstion.

I am using MSTFA + 10% TMCS ( keeping at 60C for
30 minutes) for preparing TMS derivative of the
steroids before GC analysis. By this protocol
estrone gives two products - one in which both the
phenolic (in 3rd carbon) and the keto ( in the
17th carbon) groups are derivatized and the other
in which only phenolic group is derivatized. On
the otherhand, if i use MSTFA alone,
ethnylestradiol gives rise to two product- the
alcholic OH at 17th carbon is not fully derivatized.

As i am planning to quantitate both these
analytes, it is desireable to have single peak for
each of the compound.

Can anybody help me to fix this problem?

Thanks in anticipation,

Gurusankar.