Development of ultrasound-assisted emulsification microextraction for the determination of triazine herbicides in environmental water samples by high-performance liquid chromatography

A simple, rapid, efficient, and environmentally friendly method for the determination of some triazine herbicides (simazine, atrazine, prometone, ametryn and prometryne) in water samples was developed by ultrasound-assisted emulsification microextraction (USAEME) coupled with high-performance liquid chromatography-diode array detection (HPLC-DAD). The main parameters that affect the extraction efficiencies, such as the kind and volume of the extraction solvent, ultrasound emulsification time and salt addition, were investigated and optimized. Under the optimum conditions, the method was sensitive and showed a good linearity within a range of 0.5 to 200ngmL(-1) for simazine, atrazine, prometone, ametryn and prometryne, with the correlation coefficients (r) varying from 0.9993 to 0.9998. High enrichment factors were obtained ranging from 148 to 225. The limits of detection (LODs) were in the range between 0.06 and 0.1ngmL(-1) and the limits of quantification (LOQs) were in the range between 0.2 and 0.3ngmL(-1). The recoveries of the analytes from water samples at spiking levels of 5.0 and 50.0ngmL(-1) were ranged from 82.4% to 107.0%. The relative standard deviations (RSDs) varied from 3.0% to 4.6%. The results demonstrated that the USAEME-HPLC-DAD method was an efficient pretreatment and enrichment procedure for the determination of triazine pesticides in real water samples.