Fentanyl, N-phenyl-N-[1-(2-phenylethyl)piperidin-4-yl]propanamide, has been used as a model chemical to investigate source attribution for an emerging class of hazardous chemicals. Fentanyl was synthesised by four different routes including established and more improvised routes under controlled conditions. For some routes precursor materials from four different chemical suppliers were used and the data were analysed to investigate links between precursor materials and the final products in the form of impurity profiles using gas and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS and LC-MS) and/or stable isotope and trace element (SITE) signatures (isotope ratio mass spectrometry (IRMS) and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS)). The presentation will discuss the details of the synthetic routes, analytical results and statistical analyses to identify the most promising techniques and approaches to source attribution. Prospects for the development of a more general chemical analysis-based attribution capability will be discussed including strategies and enabling technologies.

Source attribution of fentanyl through impurity and stable isotope and trace element profiling

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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