Abstract
The determination of trace-level pharmaceuticals in water is generally performed using liquid chromatography combined with mass spectrometry, which is susceptible to interference from non-target substances, such as natural organic matter (NOM). In this study, the interference of NOM on the determination of 20 typical pharmaceuticals using solid-phase extraction followed by ultra-performance liquid chromatography–electrospray ionization-triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (UPLC–ESI-tqMS) was investigated with a combined consideration of recoveries, matrix effects, and process efficiencies. The results showed that the recoveries of most pharmaceuticals were not significantly affected by NOM concentrations of 1–50 mg/L. The matrix effects and process efficiencies decreased linearly with increasing logarithmic NOM concentrations, and the changes in matrix effects and process efficiencies both exhibited negative linear correlations with the pharmaceuticals’ hydrophobicity (logKow). This result indicated that the determination of hydrophilic pharmaceuticals suffered from more severe NOM interference, as NOM entered the ESI source together with hydrophilic pharmaceuticals after UPLC separation and subsequently weakened the ionization efficiency of these pharmaceuticals. According to the correlations between logKow and the changes in matrix effects and process efficiencies, the pharmaceutical determination in positive/negative ESI modes with logKow ≤ 3.80/4.27 is considered to be significantly affected by NOM, accompanied by > 20% changes in matrix effects and process efficiencies.
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Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are available on reasonable request from the corresponding author.
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Funding
This work was financially supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2021YFA0910300), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52070093 and 51778280), Key Social Development Projects of Key R&D Plans in Jiangsu Province (BE2019708), and High-level Talent Team Project of Quanzhou City (2018CT006).
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Zheng Wang: methodology, validation, formal analysis, writing–original draft. Aimin Li: conceptualization, funding acquisition, supervision. Yufeng Liao: methodology, writing–review and editing. Chendong Shuang: funding acquisition, writing–review and editing. Yang Pan: funding acquisition, writing–review and editing. Yangyang Zhang: methodology, resources. Hongfang Sun: writing–review and editing. Qing Zhou: funding acquisition, supervision. Wentao Li: methodology, resources.
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Wang, Z., Li, A., Liao, Y. et al. The key role of hydrophobicity in the determination of pharmaceuticals by liquid chromatography–electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry under the interference of natural organic matter. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 83071–83080 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-21674-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-21674-0