Use of Poly(vinyl alcohol)-Malic Acid (CLHPMA) Hydrogels and Chitosan Coated Calcium Alginate (CCCA) Microparticles as Potential Sorbent Phases for the Extraction and Quantitative Determination of Pesticides from Aqueous Solutions.

Cristian Valdés,Adolfo Marican,Gustavo Carreño,Esteban F Durán-Lara,Diana Abril,Alfredo Pereira,Jorge Villaseñor,Daniel Bustos,Gustavo Cabrera-Barjas,Efraín Polo-Cuadrado,Oscar Valdés

doi:10.3390/polym13223993

Cristian Valdés, Adolfo Marican + Show 9 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/polym13223993

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Abstract

Pesticides are used worldwide to increase crop yields in agriculture. However, their toxicity and accumulation capacity can make them toxic to the environment, animals and humans. In the case of workers chronically exposed to these substances, they must be sampled continuously, so urine is an excellent option. In this sense, this study proposes to use poly(vinyl alcohol)-malic acid hydrogels, and chitosan-coated calcium alginate as new sorbent phases to be used in pesticide determination processes in urine. To better understand the behavior of these materials in the capture and desorption process, molecular dynamics simulations (MDS) were used, and desorption experiments were performed, using mechanical agitation, ultrasound, and pH variation in the desorption process, in order to optimize the parameters to obtain better recoveries. Under the optimal experimental conditions, the maximum recoveries were of the order of 11% (CFN), 3% (KCF), 53% (DMT), 18% (MTD) and 35% (MTL). Although the recoveries were not exhaustive, they are a first approximation for the use of these new sorbent phases in the determination of this type of compound in aqueous solutions and urine.

Highlights

The use of pesticides in agriculture helps increase crop yields to meet the demands of the growing human population
Molecular dynamics simulations were carried out to characterize the structures of hydrogels at the molecular level and their ability to release pesticides
For the Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)-malic acid (MA) hydrogel, the proportion of MA crosslinker was varied between 10%, 20% and 30%

Summary

Introduction

The use of pesticides in agriculture helps increase crop yields to meet the demands of the growing human population. Depending on the chemical structure some pesticides are persistent in the environment and can be accumulated in cattle meat, vegetables and fruits, and eaten by humans [5,6,7,8]. People exposed to these pesticides chronically, due to their work, should be able to be controlled systematically and minimally invasive. In this sense, urine is a good selection as a sample for analysis because it can be obtained in large volumes, being a non-invasive sampling, so that the repetition of sampling is not problematic [9]

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