The Use of Chromatographic Methods Coupled to Mass Spectrometry for the Study of Emerging Pollutants in the Environment

ABSTRACT

The consumption of compounds that improve the human health and wellness is increasing, and as a result, the residues of these substances reach the environment or food chain. For this reason, the scientific community is looking for new analytical methods that are more accurate and can detect the greatest number of compounds in different matrices. This manuscript compares different studies in abiotic and biotic matrices, where most of them (92%) uses Liquid Chromatography to separate the compounds. For the detection, most of the studies for both matrices uses, coupled to the chromatograph, a triple quadrupole mass spectrometer (50%) due to the precision to quantify the concentration of these compounds. Time of Flight (QToF) mass spectrometer is used in 24% of the manuscripts reviewed, in both matrices. It is possible to quantify the concentration of these compounds with the instrument but do not provide as high accuracy as the triple quadrupole.

KEYWORDS:

• Chromatography
• columns
• emerging pollutants
• mass spectrometry

Acknowledgment

The authors want to thank José Germán Martínez Paneque for his help in the proofreading of this article.

Additional information

Funding

This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (MINECO) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through Eco2TOOL-DSS project (CGL2015-64454-C2-1-R, http://www.eco2tools.es).