Pseudo-template molecularly imprinted polymeric fiber solid-phase microextraction coupled to gas chromatography for ultrasensitive determination of 2,4,6-trihalophenol disinfection by-products

Abstract

2,4,6-trihalorophenol disinfection by-products (DBPs) have strong toxicity to be needed for monitoring. In this study, two kind of molecularly imprinted polymeric fibers were prepared using 2,4,6-trichlorophenol as template and tricuronic phloroglucinol (MOP) as pseudo-template, respectively. The two fibers were assembled as solid phase microextraction (SPME) fiber to extract 2,4,6-trihalophenol DBPs from water and detect them by gas chromatography coupled to electron capture detector (GC-ECD). The results of F-test and t-test stated that there are significant difference in the analytical results of 2,4,6-trichlorophenol between using the fiber based on 2, 4, 6-trichlorophenol as template and MOP as pseudo-template. It was found that the carry-over of template (2,4,6-trichlorophenol) leaked from the fiber in GC thermal desorption, resulting in the wrong quantitative analytical result for 2,4,6-trichlorophenol in water. Hence, molecularly imprinted polymeric fibers based on MOP as pseudo-template was applied for the determination of 2,4,6-trihalophenol DBPs in water combined with GC-ECD. The selectivity of the fiber for 2,4,6-trihalophenol DBPs was investigated and demonstrated. Under the optimized condition, the method has much lower limit of detection (0.5–1.1 pg mL−1) than most reported methods. The method was applied for the determination of 2,4,6-trihalophenol DBPs in environmental water and the relative recoveries were found to be in the range from 77.1% to 105.6% and the relative standard deviation was 0.5–9.4%. 2,4,6-tribromophenol was found at concentration of 0.054 ng mL−1 in a swimming pool.