Speaker
Description
Organochlorine compounds are persistent pollutants that accumulate in water and pose risks to both ecosystems and human health. Therefore, monitoring of these compounds is of great importance, which encourages the development of new methods for their analysis. Within this research, two sorbents, activated carbon and Amberlite XAD-2, were tested for passive sampling in the analysis of organochlorine compounds in water. The sorbents, enclosed in nylon membranes, were exposed to water containing 24 organochlorine pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls, at time intervals ranging from 2 hours to 14 days, in order to evaluate their ability to retain the target compounds. After exposure, the retained compounds were extracted and analyzed by gas chromatography coupled with electron capture detection. The mass balance was determined for each compound, as well as the time for the passive sampler to reach equilibrium, which ranged from 3 to 10 days for activated carbon, and from 3 to 14 days for Amberlite XAD-2. This study showed that activated carbon and Amberlite XAD-2 are suitable as sorbents for passive sampling of selected organochlorine pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls, including α-HCH, β-HCH, 𝛾-HCH, trans- and cis- heptachlor , dieldrin, endrin, α-endosulfan and PCB 52 - indicating their potential applicability for monitoring these compounds in aquatic environment.
Keywords: passive sampler, sorbents, activated carbon, Amberlite XAD-2, organochlorine
pesticides, polychlorinated biphenyls, sorbent extraction, GC-ECD.
