Environmental issues in the Arctic region are of primary importance due to the fragility of the Arctic ecosystem. Mainly persistent organic compounds are monitored in the region by nine stationary laboratories. Information on the volatile (VOC) and semi volatile (SVOC) organic priority pollutants is very limited, especially for the Russian Arctic. Air samples from 16 sites along the Russian Arctic coast from the White Sea to the East Siberian Sea were collected on sorption tubes packed with Tenax, Carbograph, and Carboxen sorbents with different selectivity for a wide range of VOCs and SVOCs in 2020 within the framework of the International Siberian Shelf Study Expedition on the research vessel Akademik Keldysh. Thermal desorption gas chromatography–high-resolution mass spectrometry with Orbitrap was used for the analysis. Eighty-six VOCs and SVOCs were detected in the air samples at ng/m³ levels. The number of quantified compounds varied from 26 to 66 per sample. Benzoic acid was the major constituent, followed by BTEX, phenol, chloroform, bis(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate, and carbon tetrachloride. The study allowed for obtaining the first ever data on the presence of 138 priority pollutants in the air of Russian Arctic, whereas the thorough assessment of their possible sources will be the aim of a next investigation.

The study compares the efficiency of laser desorption/ionization (LDI) of six dimeric compounds, corresponding to the most important types of bonds between monomeric structural fragments of lignin macromolecules, on three types of different stainless steel target plates. It was found that ground steel target plates demonstrate the best results because of the uniform crystallization of analytes and good surface coverage. The most important ionization mechanisms for lignin oligomers with conjugated structures and increased acidity, along with protonation (cationization), involve the formation of molecular ions due to direct photoionization. For all of the studied compounds, partial in-source decay was observed, the contribution of which became significant at high laser fluence. The LDI method was successfully used to obtain mass spectra of low-molecular-weight products of the depolymerization of technical lignins. It was shown that the use of hybrid mass spectrometers with a quadrupole ion trap leads to an increase in the percentage of signals of protonated molecules in the mass spectra of lignin depolymerization products because of the occurrence of side ion-molecular reactions in the plume and ion trap.

This study presents the results of the identification and quantification of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in atmospheric aerosol particles. Suspended particulate matter (PM_2.5) was collected in Arkhangelsk, a major city in the Arctic zone, using glass fiber membrane filters with a pore size of 1.6 μm. PAHs were extracted from the particle surfaces by ultrasonic extraction in methanol. Gas chromatography coupled with high-resolution mass spectrometry (GC–HRMS) employing an Orbitrap analyzer enabled limits of detection for the target analytes ranging from 0.020 to 1.5 ng/m³ (per 1.8 m³ of air). Concentrations of individual PAHs varied from 1.2 to 4.0 ng/m³, with total concentrations of the 18 target PAHs being 17 and 32 ng/m³ for samples 2 and 1, respectively. Diagnostic ratios of PAH isomers indicated that pyrogenic sources, including incomplete fuel combustion and biomass burning, were the dominant contributors. Non-targeted screening identified 31 compounds, including oxygenated derivatives of phenanthrene and anthracene, nitrogen-containing PAHs, and high-molecular-weight PAHs, such as benzo[j]fluoranthene, benzo[e]pyrene, and perylene. These environmentally significant pollutants were present in concentrations of approximately 1–2 ng/m³.

Benzalkonium salts are widely used in the composition of antimicrobial preparations in industry and everyday life and as algaecides to treat pool water. The disinfection of tap or waste water with active chlorine in the presence of natural or anthropogenic bromide anions or using bromine as a pool water disinfectant creates conditions for the interaction of benzalkonium cations with active bromine to form disinfection by-products. This study presents the results of a model benzalkonium bromination with the identification of the resulting products by high-performance liquid and gas chromatography combined with high-resolution mass spectrometry. The primary transformation products are monobromo derivatives formed by the radical substitution of hydrogen atoms of the alkyl chain with bromine. Their further transformations yield dibromo-, hydroxy-, and hydroxybromo derivatives. The final products of the deep degradation of benzalkonium are bromoform, bromoacetonitrile, and several brominated hydrocarbons.