Determination of triazines residues in fruits and vegetables: Methods comparison of ultrasonic solvent extraction with and without solid phase clean-up

Abstract

ABSTRACT An ultrasonic solvent extraction (USE) method followed by liquid chromatography-photodiode array detector has been optimized and applied with and without solid-phase clean-up for analysis of triazines in fruits and vegetables. The correlation coefficient (r 2) > 0.999 was obtained for all the analytes at a linear range of 100–1000 µg/L. The recoveries obtained were 75–81% and 86–121% for USE with and without SPE clean-up, respectively, with relative standard deviation <20% implying good accuracy and precision. The detection limits ranged from 1.1–1.8 µg/kg to 0.6–1.0 µg/kg for USE with and without SPE clean-up, respectively. The quantification limits ranged from 3.4–5.2 µg/kg to 1.7–2.9 µg/kg for USE with and without SPE clean-up, respectively. The concentrations of triazines detected in fruits and vegetables ranged from 9 to 222 µg/kg. All the triazines were quantified at levels below the MRLs revealing no threat to human health. It can be concluded that the proposed inexpensive, environmentally friendly method can be effectively employed for regular monitoring of the concentration of the selected triazines fruits and vegetables. Moreover, it can be recommended that ultrasonic solvent extraction can be accurately applied without additional SPE clean-up.