Advice on Solid-Phase Extraction

[mfcurtis]

Hello!
I'm currently writing a research plan for a project comparing levles of the carcinogen Acrylamide in different coffee roasts. My current plan is to seperate out the acrylamide using solid-phase extraction, then test the mutagenic aspect using Hermes model test plates. I know the basics of solid-phase extraction, but I am unofortunately doing this project without a mentor so I am trying to get some feedback on my plan online. Here is the setup I was thinking of using:
Condition: Methanol
Equilibrate: Water
Load:Sample - Collect Flow Through
Wash: Water - Collect with Load Flow Through
Will this work? Also, does anyone have suggestions for my project name? I am having trouble wrapping up the whole project idea in a title.
Thanks in advance!

[caraskl]

I once did an experiment on in which I measured the concentration of acrylamide in potato chips using Gas-Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry. Because it was difficult to isolate acrylamide, I performed a bromination reaction in order to convert the acrylamide to 2,3-DBP. To isolate the product, I performed organic extraction using ethyl acetate, and I made sure to remove the surfactant and the aqueous solutions. To prepare my samples for analysis, I condensed them in a rotary evaporator, dissolved them in ethyl acetate, and ran them through a silica column gel. I was able to obtain pretty good peaks and mass abundance from the GC-MS data, so you might want to consider using the GC-MS.

Other experiments have successfully used LC-MS and solid phase extraction techniques to measure the concentration of acrylamide. The links to these papers are shown below. You might find the first one especially helpful, because it involves extracting acrylamide from coffee roasts.

http://www.gerstel.com/pdf/p-lc-an-2012-13.pdf
http://www2.epa.gov/sites/production/fi ... lamide.pdf
http://www.if.csic.es/proyectos/cost927 ... ide-VG.pdf