Ionic liquid supported three-phase liquid-liquid-liquid microextraction as a sample preparation technique for aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons prior to gas chromatography-mass spectrometry

Chanbasha Basheer, Anass Ali Alnedhary, B. S. Madhava Rao, Rajasekhar Balasubramanian, Hian Kee Lee*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

81 Scopus citations

Abstract

For the first time hollow fiber-protected ionic liquid supported three-phase (liquid-liquid-liquid) microextraction (HFM-LLLME) was developed for the gas chromatography-mass spectrometric (GC-MS) analysis of aromatic and aliphatic hydrocarbons. The hydrocarbons were extracted from 10 m1 of aqueous samples though small volumes of ionic liquid and organic solvent in the hollow fiber membrane HFM) wall and channel, respectively. The ionic liquid was immiscible with both the aqueous sample and the organic solvent (toluene). After extraction, the enriched solvent was directly injected into a GC-MS system for analysis without any further pretreatment. Ionic liquid supported HFM-LLLME shows better extraction performance than two-phase HFM-liquid-phase microextraction, in which only organic solvent is involved, and solid-phase microextraction. The ionic liquid and organic solvent combination found most suitable for HFM-LLLME was 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium hexafluorophosphate, and toluene, respectively. This new technique provided up to 210-fold enrichment of aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons in 40 min with good reproducibility (<11%) and limits of detection (1-7 ng l-1).

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)19-24
Number of pages6
JournalJournal of Chromatography A
Volume1210
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - 7 Nov 2008
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support of this research by the Agency for Science, Technology and Research of Singapore, and the National University of Singapore (Project no. R-143-000-303-112).

Keywords

  • Environmental analysis
  • Microextraction
  • Rainwater and three-phase liquid-phase microextraction

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Analytical Chemistry
  • Biochemistry
  • Organic Chemistry

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Ionic liquid supported three-phase liquid-liquid-liquid microextraction as a sample preparation technique for aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons prior to gas chromatography-mass spectrometry'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this