Selective recognition of tetracycline residues in animal derived samples based on molecularly imprinted microspheres from silica-stabilised Pickering emulsion polymerisation

ABSTRACT

Novel molecularly imprinted polymers for selective binding of tetracyclines were synthesised through oil-in-water Pickering emulsion polymerisation with SiO₂ particles as stabilisers. The products were used for solid phase extraction coupled with high-performance liquid chromatography to detect trace tetracycline and oxytetracycline in animal-derived samples. The SPE materials were characterised in detail by Fourier transform infrared spectrometry, scanning electron microscopy and thermogravimetry analysis. The imprinted polymers displayed high adsorption capacity, fast binding process and high selectivity through evaluation of adsorption performance employing kinetic, static adsorption and selectivity experiments. Under optimum detection conditions, good linearity (12 to 121 µg kg⁻¹) and limits of detection (1.8 to 1.9 μg kg⁻¹) for tetracyclines were obtained. In addition, satisfactory recoveries of 75% to 115 % were also achieved by spiking tetracyclines into milk, chicken, fish and pork samples, giving direct evidence of real practicality of our proposed separation method.

Graphical Abstract

KEYWORDS:

• MIPs
• molecular imprinting
• high performance liquid chromatography
• Pickering polymerisation
• solid phase extraction
• tetracyclines

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

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Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Open Project Program of State Key Laboratory of Food Nutrition and Safety at Tianjin University of Science & Technology under Grant No. SKLFNS-KF-201805; Science & Technology Department of Shandong Province under Grant No. 2018GNC110029 and Beijing Laboratory of Food Quality and Safety at Beijing Technology and Business University under Grant No. FQS-201805.