New approach on trace analysis of triclosan in personal care products, biological and environmental matrices

Stir bar sorptive extraction and liquid desorption followed by high performance liquid chromatography with diode array detection (SBSE-LD-LC-DAD) is proposed for the determination of triclosan in personal care products, biological and environmental matrices, which is included in the priority lists, set by several international regulatory organizations. Instrumental conditions and experimental parameters that affecting SBSE-LD efficiency are fully discussed. Throughout systematic assays on 25 mL water samples spiked at the 10.0 μg L⁻¹ level, it had been established that stir bars coated with 126 μL of polydimethylsiloxane, an equilibrium time of 1 h (1000 rpm) and acetonitrile under sonification (60 min) as back-extraction solvent, allowed the best analytical performance to determine triclosan in water matrices. From the data obtained, good recovery and remarkable repeatability were attained, providing experimental average yields (78.5 ± 2.2%), although slightly lower than the theoretical equilibrium (99.7%) described by the octanol–water partition coefficients (K_PDMS/W < K_O/W). The analytical performance proved suitable precision (<3.6%), convenient detection limits (0.1 μg L⁻¹) and excellent linear dynamic range (r² > 0.9992) from 0.4 to 108.0 μg L⁻¹. The application of the present method to determine triclosan in real matrices such as commercial toothpaste, saliva and urban wastewater samples, allowed appropriate selectivity, high sensitivity and accuracy using the standard addition methodology. The proposed method showed to be feasible and sensitive with a low-sample volume requirement to monitor triclosan in personal care products, biological and environmental matrices at the trace level, in compliance with international regulatory directives.