New trends in environmental trace-analysis of organic pollutants: class-selective immunoextraction and clean-up in one step using immunosorbents

New extraction solid-phase extraction sorbents involving antigen-antibody interactions, so-called immunosorbents, are presented. Due to the high affinity and high selectivity of these interactions, extraction and clean-up of aqueous complex environmental samples is achieved in the same step. Their application to extracts from solid samples is solvent-free and more simpler than any other clean-up procedure. Three class-selective immunosorbents have been optimised up to now which enable the trapping of two groups of widely used pesticides, i.e., phenylureas and triazines and the group of polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) with emphasis to the 16 EPA priority PAHs. Their main characteristics and properties are described and various applications are presented for detection and quantification at low trace-levels in various matrices such as drinking and surface waters, sediments and soil samples, plant tissues and food extracts. Immunoextraction on the basis of structure recognition reinforces the identification of analytes. The use of immunosorbents in off-line and on-line procedures, coupled to liquid chromatography (LC) with various detection modes, including mass spectrometry, has been validated by interlaboratory study. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.