Mass spectra of some tetra‐alkylgermanium compounds

Abstract This paper reports the monoisotopic mass spectra of the compounds Ge(Alkyl)4, in which Alkyl = methyl, ethyl, propyl, butyl, pentyl and hexyl. With the aid of metastable ion transitions the fragmentation patterns could be given. With the exception of GeMe4 these are all similar and can be explained by a few rules, the first being the tervalence of the Ge after primary ionization. In GeMe4 splitting off of alkene fragments is difficult. As the alkyl chain length increases hydrocarbon ion abundance increases considerably.