A simple strategy based on fibers coated with surfactant-functionalized multiwalled carbon nanotubes to improve the properties of solid-phase microextraction of phenols in aqueous solution

Abstract

A functionalized multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)-coated solid-phase microextraction (SPME) fiber was developed for concentrating analytes in aqueous samples. Sodium deoxycholate(NaDC) was used as a dispersing agent for non-covalent modification of MWCNTs. The coating was characterized by transmission electron microscope, scanning electron microscopy and infrared spectroscopy. It showed porous structure and had large adsorption capacity. To investigate the capability of this MWCNTs/NaDC SPME fiber, it was applied to the analysis of phenols in aqueous solution. After extraction, the analytes were desorbed in an acetonitrile–water solution and analyzed using high-performance liquid chromatography. The MWCNTs/NaDC fiber exhibited good analytical performance, and fine preparation reproducibility was obtained with the relative standard deviations (RSDs) ranging from 4.9% to 10.2% (n = 6) in one batch, from 5.7% to 11.9% (n = 3) among different batches. Under the optimum extraction conditions, the detection limits were 0.15–0.30 ng/mL(S/N=3), the linear detection ranges were 1–100 ng/mL (R2≥0.9997) for these analytes, and good recoveries(80.3%–95.4%) were obtained for the spiked samples. This is a simple and accurate pretreatment method for the analysis of phenols in aqueous samples.