Simultaneous determination of sulfonamides and fluoroquinolones from environmental water based on magnetic double-template molecularly imprinting technique

Abstract

In this work, a fast and selective method based on magnetic extraction is presented for the simultaneous extraction of sulfonamides (SAs) and fluoroquinolones (FQs), followed by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry detection. In this method, magnetic surface double-template molecularly imprinted polymers (MSdt-MIPs) with superparamagnetic property and high selectivity toward both SAs and FQs were synthesized and directly applied to the simultaneous extraction of SAs and FQs from environmental water as magnetic adsorbents. The extraction and enrichment procedures could be accomplished in one single step by stirring the mixture of MSdt-MIPs and water sample, and the MSdt-MIPs with adsorbed analytes were easily separated from the water sample by a magnet afterwards. The adsorption mechanism of MSdt-MIPs was investigated by employing the adsorption thermodynamic and kinetic studies, and the selectivity of the MSdt-MIPs toward target analytes was evaluated through the selectivity test. For validation of the proposed method, the matrix effect was evaluated and compared to that of the traditional SPE method. Excellent linearity (R > 0.9990) for both SAs and FQs were obtained in the concentration range of 20–2000 ng L⁻¹, and the limits of detection are in the range of 3.0–4.7 ng L⁻¹ for SAs while 4.1–6.1 ng L⁻¹ for FQs. Finally, the proposed method was successfully applied to the simultaneous determination of SAs and FQs in several environmental water samples.