| Abstract: | The feasibility of using ethyl acetate for the desorption of trace pollutants from a liquid chromatographic precolumn on-line into a diphenyltetramethyldisilazane-deactivated retention gap and, subsequently analysis by means of capillary gas chromatography has been demonstrated. First 5% of methanol are added to the water sample to prevent sorption of analytes onto parts of the preconcentration system. About 1 ml of this aqueous sample is injected onto a precolumn containing a polymeric stationary phase, using water–methanol (95:5, v/v) for transport and clean-up. The precolumn is desorbed with ethyl acetate and a fraction of 75 μl is injected on-line into the retention gap; separation is then achieved on a capillary CP Sil 19 column. No breakthrough of the test compounds was observed in the preconcentration step. The recovery was quantitative and the response obtained with flame ionization detection was linear in the range 0.1–100 ng/ml. The effect of varying the sorption flow rate on the recovery was studied. The system was applied to the analysis of river water. |
