A basic study of lipsticks utilizing microspectrophotometry, laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy

The purpose of this study was to determine the usefulness of laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry, microspectrophotometry (MSP) and a Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy lipstick library in discriminating between different lipsticks. FTIR spectroscopy and MSP are commonly used in forensic laboratories to analyze evidence. This research will hopefully provide additional support for using these methods for lipstick analysis. The FTIR lipstick library was constructed to determine its ability to distinguish 57 lipsticks. MSP was used to group the lipsticks into classes based on their visible absorbance spectra. Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry (MALDI-MS) is a technique commonly used by scientists in the biological and chemistry fields, but has begun to show increased applicability to forensic science. Laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry (LD/I-MS) was used for lipstick comparisons and MALDI-MS was used to identify a dye present in a lipstick.