Sample bottle coated with sorbent as a novel solid-phase extraction device for rapid on-site detection of BTEX in water.

Abstract

Solid-phase extraction (SPE) is a popular technique for environmental sample pretreatment. However, SPE usually requires complex sample pretreatment processes, which is time-consuming and inconvenient for real-time and on-site monitoring. Herein, a solvent-free, rapid, and user-friendly SPE device was developed by coating the polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)/divinylbenzene (DVB) sorbent on the inner wall of a sample bottle. The extraction process and desorption process were both carried out in the bottle. The analytes trapped in the sorbent were thermally desorbed and simultaneously sucked out from the bottle by an air sampling tube equipped on field-portable GC-MS. Different to previous work, the sample pretreatment process didn t require any complicated and time-consuming steps, such as centrifugation or filtration. The total analysis time for each sample was less than 25\xa0min, which was feasible for rapid on-site detection, and thus avoided the losses and contamination of samples in conventional sample storage and transportation processes. Under optimal conditions, the proposed SPE method exhibited wide linear ranges, low detection limits (0.010-0.036\xa0μg\xa0L-1, which were much lower than the maximum levels restricted by the US Environmental Protection Agency and the Chinese GB3838-2002 standard), good intra-bottle repeatability (6.13-7.17%, n\xa0=\xa03) and satisfactory inter-bottle reproducibility (4.73-6.47%, n\xa0=\xa03). Finally, the method was successfully applied to the rapid detection of BTEX in the field. The recoveries of BTEX in spiked water samples ranged from 89.1% to 116.2%. This work presents a novel SPE approach for rapid on-site monitoring in water samples.