Breaking the secret of prehistoric stone tools design using multidimensional chromatography

Understanding the hafting processes used during prehistory gives us an indication of the human technical capacity during those times. Hafting relies on adding a handle to a stone tool, often with the use of an organic glue (plant or animal based).1
Here dynamic headspace with two-dimensional gas chromatography coupled to a time-of-flight mass spectrometer (DHS-GCxGC-TOFMS) is applied for the characterization of pine resin and hide glue. The DHS parameters are optimized using a design of experiment approach. Several figures of merits were evaluated for quality assessment and the DHS method was challenged against an existing headspace-solid phase micro extraction (HS-SPME) – GCxGC-TOFMS approach.2
Generally, DHS was found more sensitive than HS-SPME, but the relative standard deviation was a little bit higher.
With this method a first step in a new, minimal invasive chemical identification method for prehistoric glues and resins is established. The DHS method was also evaluated against hide glue.