Tyler Wilson

Enzymatic Oxidation of Triclosan

Triclosan is used in many products that range from soaps to toys to mouthwashes because of its antimicrobial properties. Triclosan is believed to have a radical intermediate that allows triclosan to react and form different products. Different products that are formed through radical reactions could be hazardous materials.1 Our research will detect the radical in triclosan and analyze the different products that are formed to characterize if they are hazardous. This will be done by performing trials of triclosan products through HPLC to distinguish and determine the products, followed by NMR and flash chromatography to characterize the samples.

Research Daily Summaries

February 11th, 2016

Changed the solvent delayed time on the GC-MS to 3 minutes in an attempt to lower the scale of parts detected. This was done because otherwise the hexane in the solution was being detected to extremely and was not allowing the detection of any other particles. After the time correction, samples were loaded and run on the GC-MS for the 10 minute time frame. 6 different runs were saved on the GC-MS in an attempt to detect a standard. Since the standard solution was stored in multiple vials for safer storage, each of the vials was also tested in those 6 runs. Even after all the vials were run, there was still no detection of the standard in the GC-MS. There was also attempts to increase the injection size of the sample in hope of standard detection. Those trials were not saved because larger injections caused the GC-MS to detect too many ion particles of the hexane. Other runs were used to make sure all the sample was run off of the column after that.

February 16th 2016

Made sure to update wiki page and the page now includes this handy summary area. Went back and tried adjusting the solvent detection delay time for some more trials. The time was changed to 4 minutes and to reduce the hexane detection. Even after changing the delay time again, there was still no detection of the Triclosan standard on the GC-MS.

February 19th 2016

Came with ideas for photochemical reactions to recreate what was done in papers that were referenced. Turned out to be a misunderstanding and means I need to think of ideas for electrochemical reactions to acquire data for the poster and the conference. Heard that the solvents in the HPLC were changed from acetonitrile to methanol. To accommodate this new change, standards of the TC (Triclosan) were run on the HPLC using the same method developed last semester. This new method still worked correctly, because a single large peak of sample was still detected. There was one major difference in the runs when comparing solvents. The difference was that the TC eluded off of the column later in the method than what was seen with the acetonitrile runs. The difference was from 5 minutes with the acetonitrile to 10 minutes using the methanol. The data is currently posted on the poster board next to my poster.

February 23rd 2016

Updated the wiki page to explain more of what has been done. Found the paper on the phototransformation of TC in an attempt to see the HPLC data and also GCMS data that was obtained in the paper. The supporting the information on that paper had no information on HPLC or any data regarding it. There was some data on GCMS but there was no explanation of how it was obtained or what was done to obtain that data. Attempted to find other papers regarding the electrochemical reaction with TC. One paper was obtained and printed out the second paper that was about the degradation of TC electrochemically. The second paper was not obtained because it was charging $35 for 48 hours worth of use. That was something that was not needed with its current price.

February 25th 2016

Continued to search for articles about electrochemical reactions involving TC. Was not able to find any more about those types of reactions so the search was switch to try and find more general articles about TC reactions. There was nothing of value found during that search either that was more relevant or helpful compared to the papers that were already acquired. Continued to read the one paper that was obtained on February 23rd that involved electrochemical oxidation of TC.

February 26th 2016

Met with Professor Brad Sturgeon to collect cyclic voltammetry data. We were able to see the oxidation of the TC standard but there was no reduction occurring. This means that the oxidation of TC is nonreversible. There was what appeared to be a slight shift of the second and third oxidative peaks in the graph. This could mean that the oxidative product that is formed initially could also be oxidizing to form another new product. Further time will be spent looking into this to determine if it is really offset.

February 29th

Was able to transfer graphs from the electrochemical system to Igor. This allows for graphs that can be manipulated or easier to print and see. This was done to add the information onto the new poster that is currently being worked on.

February 31st 2016

Continued work on the poster for the American Chemical Society National Convention. Changed some more formatting things with the poster and added the cyclic voltammetry data to it. Poster was approved by Professor Brad Sturgeon and was then sent off to be printed.

March 22nd 2016

Labeled the points that were the maximums on the cyclic voltammetry data. Found that the data points are offset, which is really interesting. Graph was printed and pinned to Professor Sturgeons door. Took the time to further update the wiki page to keep constant progress. Will also update under instrumentation how to use the electrochemical system on different page.