Optimization of Solid Phase Extraction (SPE) for the Determination of Synthetic Musks in Water by Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS)

A procedure for the determination of synthetic musks compounds (Galaxolide (HHCB), Tonalide (AHTN), musk xylene (MX) and musk ketone (MK)) in water samples was described. Analytes were extracted from the samples using solid phase extraction (SPE) system on ENVI-C18 cartridges and then determined by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Influence of five experimental parameters (volume of eluent, composition ratio of eluent, flow rate during eluted process, methanol content in washed solution and pH of water samples) on the recovery efficiency of the SPE procedure was systematically studied using a U9(9⁵) quasi-level uniform design at three levels. Four mathematical models were obtained from nine experiments. The optimized results were in order of 12 ml, 67 % n-hexane, 0.5 ml/min, 10 % methanol, pH 6.0. Under optimal extraction conditions, recoveries from 72.15% to 90.46% were obtained for spiked water samples with relative errors from 0.80% to 9.21%.