Dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction of five chlorophenols in water samples followed by determination using capillary electrophoresis

Abstract

Dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction (DLLME) coupled with CE was developed for simultaneous determination of five types of chlorophenols (CPs), namely 2-chlorophenol (2-CP), 4-chlorophenol (4-CP), 2,4-dichlorophenol (2,4-DCP), 2,6-dichlorophenol (2,6-DCP), and 2,4,6-trichlorophenol (2,4,6-TCP) in water samples. Several parameters affecting DLLME and CE conditions were systematically investigated. Under the optimized DLLME-CE conditions, the five CPs were separated completely within 7.5 min and good enrichment factors were obtained of 40, 193, 102, 15, and 107 for 4-CP, 2,4,6-TCP, 2,4-DCP, 2-CP, and 2,6-DCP, respectively. Good linearity was attained in the range of 1–200 μg/L for 2,4,6-TCP, 2,4-DCP, 2−300 μg/L for 4-CP and 2-CP, and 1−300 μg/L for 2,6-DCP, with correlation coefficients (r) over 0.99. The LOD (S/N = 3) and the LOQ (S/N = 10) were 0.31−0.75 μg/L and 1.01−2.43 μg/L, respectively. Recoveries ranging from 60.85 to 112.36% were obtained with tap, lake, and river water spiked at three concentration levels and the RSDs (for n = 3) were 1.31–11.38%. With the characteristics of simplicity, cost-saving, and environmental friendliness, the developed DLLME-CE method proved to be potentially applicable for the rapid, sensitive, and simultaneous determination of trace CPs in complicated water samples.