Preparation of amine-modified amphiphilic resins for the extraction of trace pharmaceuticals and personal care products in environmental waters

• Published in: Journal of Chromatography A 2023-07, Vol.1701, p.464062, Article 464062
• Main Authors: Zhang, Ziang, Zhu, Feng, Ma, Yan, Huo, Zongli, Zhang, Libin, Shen, Fei, Ji, Wenliang, Zhou, Qing
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: adsorbents; Amine-modified; Amphiphilic resins; anion exchange; contact angle; detection limit; drugs; hydrophilicity; ion exchange capacity; Pharmaceuticals and personal care products; river deltas; salinity; Solid-phase extraction; SPE/LC-MS/MS; standard deviation; surface area; tandem mass spectrometry; ultra-performance liquid chromatography; Yangtze River; zeta potential
• ISSN: 0021-9673
• DOI: 10.1016/j.chroma.2023.464062

•Four amine-modified amphiphilic resins were prepared.•The resins possessed large specific surface area and high ion exchange capacity.•WAAM (NVP) maintained positive Zeta potential with change of pH.•A method of SPE/LC-MS/MS was developed.•The method demonstrated good accuracy and sensitivity. Herein, four amine-modified amphiphilic resins were synthesized and utilized as solid-phase extraction (SPE) materials to enrich pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) from environmental water. The obtained materials (Strong anion-exchange amphiphilic materials, SAAMs; Weak anion-exchange amphiphilic materials, WAAMs) possessed large specific surface area (473–626 m2/g), high ion exchange capacity (0.89–1.97 mmol/g), and small contact angle (74.41–79.74°), indicating good hydrophilicity. The main factors affecting the efficiency of the extraction process were studied, including column volume, column flow rate, sample salinity and sample pH. Notably, the trend observed in absolute recovery was significantly correlated with the Zeta potential of the employed adsorbents. Furthermore, based on the obtained materials, a method of SPE coupled with ultra-performance liquid chromatography and tandem mass spectrometry (SPE/LC-MS/MS) was developed, and then utilized to determine PPCPs in the samples collected from the Yangtze River Delta. The Method detection limit (MDL) and Method quantification limit (MQL) ranged from 0.05 to 0.60 ng/L and 0.17 to 2.00 ng/L, respectively, with a relative standard deviation (RSD) below 6.3%, demonstrating good accuracy and sensitivity. As evidenced by comparison with previous literature, the developed method exhibited satisfactory performance, showing great potential for further commercial application in the extraction of trace PPCPs from environmental water samples.