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l-Cysteine Functionalized Silica Gel as an Efficient Adsorbent for the Determination of Heavy Metals in Foods by ICP-MS

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Abstract

A novel l-cysteine functionalized silica gel adsorbent (SG-Cys) was successfully synthesized and characterized by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra and elemental analysis. An efficient method for simultaneous determination of heavy metals [V (V), Cr (VI), Cu (II), As (V), Cd (II), and Pb (II)] was developed by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) coupled with pre-concentration with the prepared SG-Cys adsorbent. The experimental parameters, including the solution pH, sample flow rate, eluent volume, eluent type, and concentration, have been systematically optimized to obtain higher enrichment factors of target ions. Under the optimum conditions, the enrichment factors of V (V), Cr (VI), Cu (II), As (V), Cd (II), and Pb (II) reached 123, 100, 86, 106, 97, and 94, respectively, and the detection limits were as low as 1.8–3.7 ng L−1. The proposed method has been applied to the determination of trace heavy metals in water, rice, wheat, corn, and tea samples, which exhibited a satisfactory recovery in the range of 90.6–106.0 %.

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Abbreviations

ICP-MS:

Inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry

SPE:

Solid phase extraction

DMF:

N, N-dimethylformamide

CPTS:

Chloroproply triethoxysilane

SG-Cys:

l-cysteine functionalized silica gel adsorbent

FAAS/GFAAS:

Flame/graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry

ICP-OES:

Inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry

NAA:

Neutron activation analysis

FTIR:

Fourier transform infrared spectra

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Acknowledgments

This study is supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (Project No. 2012BAK17B03), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project No. 31171683), the Special Fund for Agro-scientific Research in the Public Interest of China (Project No. 201203069), and the Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University (Project No. IRT1166)

Conflict of Interest

Cuicui Liu declares that she has no conflict of interest. Shaoyuan He declares that she has no conflict of interest. Kun Shen declares that he has no conflict of interest. Xue Feng declares that she has no conflict of interest. Guozhen Fang declares that she has no conflict of interest. Shuo Wang declares that he has no conflict of interest. This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Food Nutrition and Safety, Ministry of Education, Tianjin Key Laboratory of Food Nutrition and Safety, Tianjin University of Science and Technology, 29 The Thirteenth Road, Tianjin Economy and Technology Development Area, Tianjin, 300457, China

    Cuicui Liu, Shaoyuan He, Xue Feng, Guozhen Fang & Shuo Wang

  2. School of Life Sciences, Northeast Normal University, 5268 Renmin Street, Changchun, Jilin, 130024, China

    Kun Shen

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  1. Cuicui Liu
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  2. Shaoyuan He
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  3. Kun Shen
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  4. Xue Feng
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  5. Guozhen Fang
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  6. Shuo Wang
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Correspondence to Shuo Wang.

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Liu, C., He, S., Shen, K. et al. l-Cysteine Functionalized Silica Gel as an Efficient Adsorbent for the Determination of Heavy Metals in Foods by ICP-MS. Food Anal. Methods 8, 1785–1793 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12161-014-0061-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12161-014-0061-y

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