Resolution of ternary mixtures of salicylic, salicyluric and gentisic acids by partial least squares and principal component regression: Optimization of the scanning path in the excitation-emission matrices

The resolution of ternary mixtures of salicylic, salicyluric and gentisic acids has been accomplished by partial least squares (PLS) and principal component regression (PCR) multivariate calibration. The total luminescence information of the compounds has been used to optimize the spectral data set to perform the calibration. A comparison between the predictive ability of the three multivariate calibration methods, PLS-1, PLS-2 and PCR, on three spectral data sets, excitation, emission and synchronous spectra, has been performed. The excitation spectrum has been the best scanning path for salicylic and salicyluric acid determinations, while the emission spectrum has been the best for the gentisic acid determination. The convenience of analysing the total luminescence spectrum information when using multivariate calibration methods on fluorescence data is demonstrated.     

Selective Array-Based Sensing of Anabolic Steroids in Aqueous Solution by Host–Guest Reporter Complexes

Arrayed complexes of a water-soluble deep cavitand and two fluorescent indicators show selective sensing of anabolic-androgenic steroids in aqueous environments. By combining the host–guest complexes with small amounts of heavy metal ions, discrimination between steroids that vary in structure by only a single π bond is possible. The sensing occurs through a triggered aggregation mechanism, which can be mediated by both the presence of metal ions and the steroids. The use of both “turn-on” and “turn-off” fluorophores is essential for good discrimination. As low as 10 μm steroid can be detected, and the discrimination is selective in steroid samples spiked into human urine.     

Non-destructive method to determine halophenols and haloanisoles in cork stoppers by headspace sorptive extraction

The new solvent-free technique called headspace sorptive extraction (HSSE) was used to determine 2,4,6-trichlorophenol, 2,3,4,6-tetrachlorophenol, 2,4,6-trichloroanisole, 2,3,4,6-tetrachloroanisole, 2,4,6-tribromoanisole, pentachloroanisole in cork stoppers, without grinding them, as these may be responsible for the cork taint off-flavour in wine. The best HSSE sorption kinetics for the target analytes were obtained after submitting the spiked corks to 100 degrees C for 1h, followed by a 30 min stabilization time at room temperature. The stir bar was desorbed in a thermal desorption system coupled to a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer. The method proposed showed good linearity over the concentration range tested, 1-70 ngg(-1), and correlation coefficients ranged from 0.90 to 0.99 for all the analytes. The reproducibility and repeatability of the method were estimated between 4.91 and 12.67%. The effect of the different cork matrixes on the extraction recovery of the target compounds was studied, with the natural corks showing the higher recovery percentage in relation to agglomerate ones.     

Multienzymatic-rotating biosensor for total cholesterol determination in a FIA system

Fabrication of an amperometric-rotating biosensor for the enzymatic determination of cholesterol is reported. The assay utilizes a combination of three enzymes: cholesterol esterase (ChE), cholesterol oxidase (ChOx) and peroxidase (HRP); which were co-immobilizing on a rotatory disk. The method is developed by the use of a glassy carbon electrode as detector versus Ag/AgCl/3 M NaCl in conjunction with a soluble-redox mediator 4-tert-butylcatechol (TBC). ChE converts esterified cholesterol to free cholesterol, which is then oxidized by ChOx with hydrogen peroxide as product. TBC is converted to 4-tert-butylbenzoquinone (TBB) by hydrogen peroxide, catalyzed by HRP, and the glassy carbon electrode responds to the TBB concentration. The system has integrated a micro packed-column with immobilized ascorbate oxidase (AAOx) that works as prereactor to eliminate l-ascorbic acid (AA) interference. This method could be used to determine total cholesterol concentration in the range 1.2 μM-1 mM (r = 0.999). A fast response time of 2 min has been observed with this amperometric-rotating biosensor. Lifetime is up to 25 days of use. The calculated detection limits was 11.9 nM. Reproducibility assays were made using repetitive standards solutions (n = 5) and the percentage standard error was less than 4%.     

Wavelet expansions for weighted,vector-valued BMO functions

We introduce a scale of weighted Carleson norms, which depend on an integrability parameter p, where p = 2 corresponds to the classical Carleson measure condition. Relations between the weighted BMO norm of a vector-valued function f: ℝ → X, and the Carleson norm of the sequence of its wavelet coefficients, are established. These extend the results of Harboure-Salinas-Viviani, also in the scalar-valued case when p ≠ 2.     

Cross-sections of spectrochromatograms for the resolution of overlapping peaks in diode-array high-performance liquid-chromatography

Multi-wavelength detectors offer improved detection capabilities for liquid chromatographic methods, but require multivariate approaches to utilise all the available information. The photodiode-array detector in high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) generates a three-dimensional data matrix, which is conventionally presented as an isometric projection or a contour plot. In this work, a new graphical technique is described for improving the quantitative results obtained from HPLC, using the available spectrochromatographic information in both the time and wavelength domains. The technique consists of performing cross-sections through the data matrix to obtain the maximum analytical information for each of the analytes. Hence, the resolution of overlapping peaks and the sensitivity in the determination are optimised. In order to demonstrate the validity and simplicity of the approach, the method has been applied to the resolution of synthetic mixtures of iprodione, procymidone and chlorothalonil. Also, the method has been satisfactorily applied to the simultaneous determination of the pesticides in environmental groundwater samples.