Characterization of ionized heterocyclic carbenes by ion-molecule reactions.

1,2-Hydrogen shift isomers of ionized pyridine, thiazole and imidazole are readily characterized by the study of their associative ion-molecule reactions with dimethyl disulfide in the quadrupole collision cell of a new hybrid sector-quadrupole-sector mass spectrometer. Efficient trapping reactions of CH(3)S(.) radicals are indeed observed and the actual structure of the adduct [M + CH(3)S](+) ions is clearly indicated by their high-energy collisional activation mass spectra. These trapping reactions are not observed for the 'conventional' pyridine, thiazole and imidazole molecular ions, which only react by charge exchange producing m/z 94, [CH(3)SSCH(3)](*+), ions. Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.