Direct aqueous injection with backflush thermal desorption for wastewater monitoring by online GC-MS

A gas chromatography—mass spectrometry system with a novel injector type, which is designed for direct aqueous injection of wastewater, is presented. The system is used for online monitoring of the influent of the wastewater treatment plant at BASF’s main chemical production site in Ludwigshafen, Germany. The purpose of monitoring is to protect the biological treatment process and the receiving water body, the Rhine. The modular system is primarily based on commercial equipment, but utilizes a special injection system, which is connected to a Deans switch. The two-stage injector consists of a programmable temperature vaporizer (PTV) injector with a small volume insert for vaporization and a dual sorbent packed second PTV for analyte adsorption/desorption. The Deans switch allows a backflush/thermal desorption operation which enables the direct injection of filtered, crude wastewater. About 170 volatile and semivolatile compounds are calibrated with approximate detection limits of 1 mg/L, which are sufficient for the analysis of untreated wastewater. The quantitative results are transferred to a database which is connected to a process control system. If the wastewater does not meet the required specification, an alarm is generated and the wastewater is diverted into a storage basin. Special software programs and routines allow for reliable, unattended operation and remote instrument control. Data quality is automatically controlled in each run and through the daily analysis of quality control samples. The current design allows for analysis of volatile compounds, such as methanol, whereas an earlier injector setup restricted the range of analytes to less volatile compounds (of size C₄ or greater).     

Trace analysis of pesticides in paddy field water by direct injection using liquid chromatography-quadrupole-linear ion trap-mass spectrometry

A multiresidue method was developed for the quantification and confirmation of 70 pesticides in paddy field water. After its filtration, water was injected directly in a liquid chromatograph coupled to a hybrid triple quadrupole-linear ion trap-mass spectrometer (QqLIT). The list of target analytes included organophosphates, phenylureas, sulfonylureas, carbamates, conazoles, imidazolinones and others compounds widely used in different countries where rice is cropped. Detection and quantification limits achieved were in the range from 0.4 to 80 ng L(-1) and from 2 to 150 ng L(-1), respectively. Correlation coefficients for the calibration curves in the range 0.1-50 μg L(-1) were higher than 0.99 except for diazinon (0.1-25 μg L(-1)). Only 9 pesticides presented more than 20% of signal suppression/enhancement, no matrix effect was observed in the studied conditions for the rest of the target pesticides. The method developed was used to investigate the occurrence of pesticides in 59 water samples collected in paddy fields located in Spain and Uruguay. The study shows the presence of bensulfuron methyl, tricyclazole, carbendazim, imidacloprid, tebuconazole and quinclorac in a concentration range from 0.08 to 7.20 μg L(-1).     

Trace analysis of volatile polar organics by direct aqueous injection gas chromatography

Summary Procedures for the quantitative analysis of industrial effluents which involve concentration by solvent extraction or the purge-and-trap method are time-consuming, labor-intensive, and prone to error. Direct aqueous injection gas chromatography using an electron-capture detector for the analysis of volatile halocarbons at the ppb level is in routine use in many laboratories. We now discuss the development of a similar protocol for the analysis of volatile polar organics such as acetone, methyl ethyl ketone, methyl isobutyl ketone, and tretrahydrofuran using a flame-ionization detector.     

Fluoxetine and norfluoxetine analysis by direct injection of human plasma in a column switching liquid chromatographic system

A column switching LC method is presented for the analysis of fluoxetine (FLU) and norfluoxetine (NFLU) by direct injection of human plasma using a lab-made restricted access media (RAM) column. A RAM-BSA-octadecyl silica (C-18) column (40 mm x 4.6 mm, 10 microm) is evaluated in both backflush and foreflush elution modes and coupled with a C-18 lab-made (50 mm x 4.6 mm, 3 microm) analytical column in order to perform online sample preparation. Direct injection of 100 microL of plasma samples is possible with the developed approach. In addition, reduction of sample handling is obtained when compared with traditional liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) and SPE. The total analysis time is around 20 min. A LOQ of 15 ng/mL is achieved in a concentration range of 15-500 ng/mL, allowing the therapeutic drug monitoring of clinical samples. The precision values achieved are lower than 15% for all the evaluated points with adequate recovery and accuracy. Furthermore, no matrix interferences are found in the analysis and the proposed method shows to be an adequate alternative for analysis of FLU in plasma.     

Analysis of pesticide residues using the Quick Easy Cheap Effective Rugged and Safe (QuEChERS) pesticide multiresidue method in combination with gas and liquid chromatography and tandem mass spectrometric detection

The Quick Easy Cheap Effective Rugged and Safe multiresidue method (QuEChERS) has been validated for the extraction of 80 pesticides belonging to various chemical classes from various types of representative commodities with low lipid contents. A mixture of 38 pesticides amenable to gas chromatography (GC) were quantitatively recovered from spiked lemon, raisins, wheat flour and cucumber, and determined using gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (GC-MS/MS). An additional mixture of 42 pesticides were recovered from oranges, red wine, red grapes, raisins and wheat flour, using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) for determination. The pesticides chosen for this study included many of the most frequently detected ones and/or those that are most often found to violate the maximum residue limit (MRL) in food samples, some compounds that have only recently been introduced, as well as a few other miscellaneous compounds. The method employed involved initial extraction in a water/acetonitrile system, an extraction/partitioning step after the addition of salt, and a cleanup step utilizing dispersive solid-phase extraction (D-SPE); this combination ensured that it was a rapid, simple and cost-effective procedure. The spiking levels for the recovery experiments were 0.005, 0.01, 0.02 and 0.2 mg kg(-1) for GC-MS/MS analyses, and 0.01 and 0.1 mg kg(-1) for LC-MS/MS analyses. Adequate pesticide quantification and identity confirmation were attained, even at the lowest concentration levels, considering the high signal-to-noise ratios, the very good accuracies and precisions, as well as the good matches between the observed ion ratios. Mean recoveries mostly ranged between 70 and 110% (98% on average), and relative standard deviations (RSD) were generally below 10% (4.3% on average). The use of analyte protectants during GC analysis was demonstrated to provide a good alternative to the use of matrix-matched standards to minimize matrix-effect-related errors. Based on these results, the methodology has been proven to be highly efficient and robust and thus suitable for monitoring the MRL compliance of a wide range of commodity/pesticide combinations.     

The gas chromatographic determination of volatile fatty acids in wastewater samples: Evaluation of experimental biases in direct injection method against thermal desorption method

The production of short-chained volatile fatty acids (VFAs) by the anaerobic bacterial digestion of sewage (wastewater) affords an excellent opportunity to alternative greener viable bio-energy fuels (i.e., microbial fuel cell). VFAs in wastewater (sewage) samples are commonly quantified through direct injection (DI) into a gas chromatograph with a flame ionization detector (GC-FID). In this study, the reliability of VFA analysis by the DI-GC method has been examined against a thermal desorption (TD-GC) method. The results indicate that the VFA concentrations determined from an aliquot from each wastewater sample by the DI-GC method were generally underestimated, e.g., reductions of 7% (acetic acid) to 93.4% (hexanoic acid) relative to the TD-GC method. The observed differences between the two methods suggest the possibly important role of the matrix effect to give rise to the negative biases in DI-GC analysis. To further explore this possibility, an ancillary experiment was performed to examine bias patterns of three DI-GC approaches. For instance, the results of the standard addition (SA) method confirm the definite role of matrix effect when analyzing wastewater samples by DI-GC. More importantly, their biases tend to increase systematically with increasing molecular weight and decreasing VFA concentrations. As such, the use of DI-GC method, if applied for the analysis of samples with a complicated matrix, needs a thorough validation to improve the reliability in data acquisition.     

Multi-residue analysis of pesticides in tea by online SEC-GC/MS

A multi-residue method for the analysis of pesticides in tea was developed by online size exclusion chromatography (SEC)-GC/MS with full scan mode. The sample was fortified with chlorpyrifos-d(10) isotope internal standard and extracted by acetonitrile. After purification by primary secondary amine sorbent and solvent exchange by SEC mobile phase, the sample was detected by online SEC-GC/MS. The purification result of the online system was evaluated by comparing the correlation between Chinese cabbage and tea matrix. The factors for method optimization included sample preparation, matrix effects and the instrument parameters of each online component. Scatter plot was introduced in this study to directly illustrate the results of the condition optimization and matrix effects in the online system. For most of the pesticides, the average recoveries ranged from 70 to 130% and the RSD were below 15%. The feasibility of the application of full scan mode in multi-residue determination of trace amounts of pesticides (LODs below 0.01 mg/kg) in a complex matrix was discussed.     

Screening of trihalomethanes by direct aqueous injection using electron capture detection

The disinfection of drinking water with chlorine produces carcinogenic by-products called trihalomethanes or (THM's). These compounds are formed when the chlorine reacts with the organic matter in the raw water. The four major THM's are chloroform, bromodichloromethane, dibromochromethane, and bromoform. Direct aqueous injection is used for the rapid screening THM's and other volatile organic compounds (VOC's) in water by direct on column injection of the water sample in to wide bore capillary columns, to which is attached an electron capture detector.     

Determination of cholesterol in milk fat by gas chromatography with direct injection and sample saponification

Summary A rapid and direct gas chromatographic (GC) method for determining free cholesterol in milk fat using a capillary column and programmed-temperature vaporizer-injector was assayed. It was compared with other procedures involving saponification of fat, solvent extraction of unsaponifiable matter — with and without fractionation by thin-layer chromatography — and transformation of sterols into silyl derivatives prior to GC analysis. This paper proposes an alternative to other published procedures. Repeatability of the method was assessed and the coefficient of variation determined as 2.1 %. The alternative saponification method exhibited comparable accuracy (coefficient of variation=1.8 %). Recovery ranged from 99.1 % to 105.6 %.     

Determination of metformin in rat plasma by HILIC-MS/MS combined with Tecan automation and direct injection

Metformin is a well‐known oral antihyperglycemic drug used in treatment of type II diabetes. Analysis of metformin in biological fluids is a challenge owing to its high polarity and small molecular size, which lead to poor retention of metformin on reversed‐phase liquid chromatographic columns. A high‐throughput method was developed and validated for the determination of metformin in rat plasma in support of preclinical toxicology studies, using hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (HILIC‐MS/MS) and Tecan automated sample preparation. Extracted samples were directly injected onto the unbounded silica column with an aqueous–organic mobile phase. This HILIC‐MS/MS method was validated for accuracy, precision, sensitivity, stability, matrix effect, recovery and calibration range. Acceptable intra‐run and inter‐run assay precision (coefficient of variation ≤ 3.9%) and accuracy (99.0–101.8%) were achieved over a linear range of 50–50,000 ng/mL. Metformin is stable in rat plasma for at least 6 h at room temperature, 147 days at ?70°C and through three freeze (?70°C) and thaw cycles. Metformin is also stable in rat whole blood for at least 2 h at room temperature and in an ice–water bath. The validated method was successfully used in support of several preclinical studies where metformin is dosed together with an investigational drug substance. The ruggedness of the validated method was demonstrated by the incurred sample reproducibility test. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Determination of cholesterol in milk fat by gas chromatography with direct injection and sample saponification

Summary A rapid and direct gas chromatographic (GC) method for determining free cholesterol in milk fat using a capillary column and programmed-temperature vaporizerinjector was assayed. It was compared with other procedures involving saponification of fat, solvent extraction of unsaponifiable matter—with and without fractionation by thin-layer chromatography—and transformation of sterols into silyl derivatives prior to GC analysis. This paper proposes an alternative to other published procedures. Repeatability of the method was assessed and the coefficient of variation determined as 2.1%. The alternative saponification method exhibited comparable accuracy (coefficient of variation=1.8%). Recovery ranged from 99.1% to 105.6%.     

Analysis of iso-alpha-acids and reduced iso-alpha-acids in beer by direct injection and liquid chromatography with ultraviolet absorbance detection or with mass spectrometry

A liquid chromatography (LC) method is described for the simultaneous analysis of iso-alpha-acids and reduced iso-alpha-acids in beer. Volatile mobile phase additives were selected to enable hyphenation to mass spectrometric (MS) operated in the atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI) mode. Contrary to other recent LC optimization procedures for the same compounds, an alkaline pH was selected hereby improving peak shape and selectivity. Both UV and MS detection are sensitive enough to analyze beers without sample pre-concentration. All major bitter acids are separated within 65 min with exception of cis-dihydroisoadhumulone, which co-elutes with trans-isocohumulone. Due to the selectivity of the MS, these compounds could be differentiated according to their m/z value. The performance in terms of quantification of bitter acids by LC-UV and LC-MS are compared for standard solutions and a selection of 14 beers.     

Hollow‐fiber liquid‐phase microextraction for the direct determination of flumequine in urban wastewaters by flow‐injection analysis with terbium‐sensitized chemiluminescence

A flow‐injection analysis chemiluminescence method based on the enhancement effect of the flumequine‐Tb(III) complex on the weak native emission of the Ce(IV)‐Na₂SO₃ system has been developed for the determination of flumequine. The method includes a cleanup and preconcentration stage (750‐fold) of the sample by hollow‐fiber liquid‐phase microextraction using an Accurel^® Q 3/2 polypropylene hollow fiber impregnated with 1‐octanol as the supported liquid membrane. The obtained 50 μL acceptor phase was injected in a 1 mM Tb(III) + 4 mM Ce(IV) in 5% v/v H₂SO₄ stream and mixed with a 2 mM Na₂SO₃ stream before its introduction into the flow cell. The chemiluminescence signal was linear in the 0.3–15 ng/mL range, with detection and quantitation limits of 0.1 and 0.3 ng/mL, respectively. The method allows the selective extraction and determination of flumequine in wastewater samples, using simpler and lower‐cost instrumentation and with shorter extraction and analysis times than traditional high‐performance liquid chromatography analysis.     

The fundamental properties of the direct injection method in the analysis of gaseous reduced sulfur by gas chromatography with a pulsed flame photometric detector

In this study, the fundamental aspects of gas chromatography with a pulsed flame photometric detector were investigated through the calibration of gaseous reduced sulfur compounds based on the direct injection method. Gaseous standards of five reduced sulfur compounds (hydrogen sulfide, methane thiol, dimethyl sulfide, carbon disulfide, and dimethyl disulfide) were calibrated as a function of injection volume and concentration level. The results were evaluated by means of two contrasting calibration approaches: fixed standard concentration method (variable volumetric injection of standard gases prepared at a given concentration) and fixed standard volume method (injection of multiple standards with varying concentrations at a given volume). The optimum detection limit values of reduced sulfur compounds, when estimated at 100 μL of injection volume, ranged from 2.37 pg (carbon disulfide) to 4.89 pg (dimethyl sulfide). Although these detection limit values improved gradually with decreasing injection volume, the minimum detectable concentration (e.g., in nmol mol⁻¹ scale) remained constant due to a balance by the sample volume reduction. The linearity property of pulsed flame photometric detector also appeared to vary dynamically with changes in its sensitivity. According to this study, the performance of pulsed flame photometric detector, when tested by direct injection method, is highly reliable to precisely describe the behavior of reduced sulfur compounds above ∼20 nmol mol⁻¹.     

固相萃取-大体积程序升温进样气相色谱-三重四极杆串联质谱测定饮用水中3种挥发性N-亚硝胺

建立了固相萃取大体积程序升温进样气相色谱-三重四极杆质谱联用（GC-QqQ-MS/MS）同时测定饮用水中N-亚硝基二甲胺、N-亚硝基甲基乙基胺及N-亚硝基二乙基胺的分析方法。用椰壳活性炭固相萃取小柱萃取水样中待测物组分，少量二氯甲烷洗脱、无水硫酸钠脱水，大体积程序升温进样，气相色谱-三重四极杆质谱联用仪进行多反应监测（MRM）模式检测，外标法定量。3种N-亚硝胺在1~50 ng/L范围内线性关系良好，相关系数（r²）均大于0.999，在饮用水中进行10、20和50 ng/L水平的添加，3种待测物平均加标回收率为94.8%~109%，相对标准偏差（RSD）为4.44%~8.10%（n=5），定量限（LOQ）为0.08~0.7 ng/L。该法灵敏、准确、简单、可靠，适用于饮用水中3种N-亚硝胺组分的痕量检测。