Separation and determination of estrone in environmental and drinking water using molecularly imprinted solid phase extraction coupled with HPLC

Estrone has been identified as an important potential endocrine-disrupting compound, so that sensitive and reliable analytical methods are required for its determination and the assurance of human health. Using estrone as the template, acrylamide as the functional monomer, and methacryloxypropyltrimethoxysilane as the cross-linker, an organic-inorganic hybrid material has been synthesized by the molecular imprinting technique combined with a non-hydrolytic so-gel process. The synthesized polymer was characterized by FT-IR and static adsorption experiments, and the results showed that it had good recognition and selective ability for estrone. A novel method for separation and determination of trace estrone in water samples was developed using molecularly imprinted solid phase extraction coupled with HPLC. Under the selected experimental condition, the detection limit (S/N = 3) was 9.3 ng/L, and the RSD for five replicate extractions of 10 mug/L estrone was less than 5.0%. This method was employed for quantitative determination of estrone in river, lake, and tap water with recoveries ranging from 83.38 to 98.12%.