Postmortem distribution of PV9, a new cathinone derivative, in human solid tissues in a fatal poisoning case

In our previous study, we identified PV9 [1-phenyl-2-(pyrrolidin-1-yl)octan-1-one] in human blood and urine in a fatal poisoning case. The victim was an 18-year-old woman. After ingesting “aroma liquid” solution, the victim showed various symptoms including low levels of consciousness, and was taken to a hospital emergency department. Although the victim received intensive medical treatment including an intravenous drip infusion of a large volume of transfusion solution, she was pronounced dead about 20 h after admission. In this study, we carefully examined the postmortem distribution of PV9 in nine solid tissues of the victim collected at forensic autopsy. The extraction of PV9 and internal standard (IS) PV8 [1-phenyl-2-(1-pyrrolidinyl)-1-heptanone] was performed by acetonitrile deproteinization, followed by modified QuEChERS dispersive solid-phase extraction and filtration through Captiva ND Lipids cartridges. Anaysis was performed by liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry. Because this study dealt with various kinds of human matrices, we used the standard addition method to overcome matrix effects. After thorough validations, such as checking the product ion mass spectra, selected reaction monitoring chromatograms, linearity of the standard addition calibration curves, the intraday and interday repeatability, matrix effects, and recovery rates for the method, the concentrations of PV9 in nine solid tissue specimens were measured using PV8 as IS. The highest level of PV9 was found in the kidney at 907 ± 19.5 ng/g followed by the skeletal muscle, pancreas, adipose tissue, liver, lung, spleen, heart muscle, and brain. The lowest level of PV9 in the brain was 212 ± 11.9 ng/g. The high level of PV9 in the kidney suggests that this drug tends to be rapidly excreted into urine via the kidney as was the case for α-pyrrolidinovalerophenone. The low concentration of PV9 in the brain was unexpected, because this drug is a psychotropic drug with a long hydrophobic side chain, and is considered to cross the blood–brain barrier very easily. To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of the distribution of the new pyrrolidinophenone derivative PV9 in human solid tissues in a poisoning case.