Solid-phase extraction of nerve agents’ degradation products using polymeric thin film

Abstract

In this study, polymer film containing ammonium group was prepared by surface initiated polymerization. The prepared polymer film was applied to SPE of organophosphonic acids. The polymeric film and organophonic extracted film were characterized by ellipsometric thickness measurement, contact angle measurement, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, infrared spectroscopy and time-of- flight secondary ion mass spectrometry. In addition, the effect of extraction time, pH, salt and interfering substances was observed by using infrared spectroscopy, and it was confirmed that the increase of salt and pH had a great influence on the extraction efficiency.

The analytical method combined with SPE using the polymer film for gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS), which is widely used in chemical agent verification, was also developed. For the GC-MS analysis, in-titu trimethylsilylation of organophonic acids was performed, followed by head space using SPME fiber. We optimized the method on several parameters and performed the method validation. Applicability to the real sample of the developed method could be confirmed by applying it to the Organization for Prohibition of Chemical Weapon proficiency test sample.

In this study, it was confirmed that the SPE using polymer film can perform sample preparation more efficiently and analyze analytes without further processing by using surface analysis method. SPE using polymer films are considered to be very effective for the treatment of large numbers of samples. Although this study deals only with organophosphoric acid, the use of various types of polymer films will allow further extension of the analytes.