Pesticides Analysis: Advantages of Increased Dimensionality in Gas Chromatography and Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

For a century, pesticides have been an integral component of the environmental system of the world. There has been increasing attention paid to the regulation and analysis of these compounds. Gas chromatography (GC) and mass spectrometry (MS) are two of the most important analytical techniques employed for high throughput pesticide analysis. This review features applications, advantages, and comparison of different GC and MS techniques based on applied separation dimensionalities related to column and/or mass analyzers. A brief historical perspective, a primary focus on recent developments, and a view to future trends will be highlighted here. Multidimensional analysis, employing novel types of stationary phases for GC, will be considered, along with the role of hyphenation with emerging MS technologies.

KEY WORDS:

• comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography
• GC × GC
• multidimensional gas chromatography
• MS/MS
• quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry
• triple-quadrupole mass spectrometry
• time-of-flight mass spectrometry