QuEChERS sample preparation for the determination of pesticides and other organic residues in environmental matrices: a critical review

Abstract

Quick, Easy, Cheap, Effective, Rugged, and Safe (QuEChERS) is an extraction and clean-up technique originally developed for recovering pesticide residues from fruits and vegetables. Since its introduction, and until December 2013, about 700 papers have been published using the QuEChERS technique, according to a literature overview carried out using SciFinder, Elsevier SciVerse, and Google search engines. Most of these papers were dedicated to pesticide multiresidue analysis in food matrices, and this topic has been thoroughly reviewed over recent years. The QuEChERS approach is now rapidly developing beyond its original field of application to analytes other than pesticides, and matrices other than food, such as biological fluids and non-edible plants, including Chinese medicinal plants. Recently, the QuEChERS concept has spread to environmental applications by analyzing not only pesticides but also other compounds of environmental concern in soil, sediments, and water. To the best of our knowledge, QuEChERS environmental applications have not been reviewed so far; therefore, in this contribution, after a general discussion on the evolution and changes of the original QuEChERS method, a critical survey of the literature regarding environmental applications of conventional and modified QuEChERS methodology is provided. The overall recoveries obtained with QuEChERS and other extraction approaches (e.g., accelerated solvent extraction, ultrasonic solvent extraction, liquid/solid extraction, and soxhlet extraction) were compared, providing evidence for QuEChERS higher recoveries for various classes of compounds, such as biopesticides, chloroalkanes, phenols, and perfluoroalkyl substances. The role of physicochemical properties of soil (i.e., clay and organic carbon content, as well as cation exchange capacity) and target analytes (i.e., log KOW, water solubility, and vapor pressure) were also evaluated in order to interpret recovery and matrix effect data.

Simultaneous determination of 24 personal care products in fish muscle and liver tissues using QuEChERS extraction coupled with ultra pressure liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry and gas chromatography-mass spectrometer analyses

“…The results demonstrated that GCB was not effective in d-SPE because the removal of some target compounds occurred, which is consistent with the previous study [42,45]. GCB shows strong absorption ability to planar compounds due to its highly polar groups on the surface, such as thiabendazole-D 6 that acts as the internal standard of four benzotriazoles (BT, 5-TT, CBT, and XT) [40,46]; the recoveries of four benzotriazoles were high to 398 %. Besides, for the samples purified with the d-SPE set containing Z-Sep sorbent (set (e)), the recoveries for most of the analytes did not show any improvement compared with the samples cleaned with sets (a), (b), and (c).…”

“…Extracts usually contain various matrix substances such as humic acid and fats [40]. Especially for biota tissues, lipids, proteins, amino acids, and other biomolecules could also have been extracted out simultaneously with target chemicals during the salt extraction process.…”

A simple and rapid analytical methodology based on liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry for monitoring pesticide residues in soils from Argentina

“…Among these, the Quick, Easy, Cheap, Effective, Rugged and Safe (QuEChERS) procedure is one of the most popular 14 . Originally developed for fruits and vegetables, QuEChERS is being applied to many other matrices, including soil samples [15][16][17] . The original procedure consisted on extraction with acetonitrile, separation of water by addition of anhydrous MgSO 4 and NaCl, and subsequent cleanup using dispersive solid-phase extraction (d-SPE) 14 .…”

Determination of Organochlorine Pesticides in Wildlife Liver and Serum Using Gas Chromatography Tandem Quadrupole Mass Spectrometry

“…The method was developed and utilized extensively by agricultural laboratories for pesticide residue testing of fruits and vegetables and environmental samples. The QuEChERS method has been the subject of recent review of pesticide analysis in food [9] and in environmental samples [10]. The extensive use of the method has led to commercial QuEChERS extraction kits from several vendors and an official AOAC method for analysis of pesticide residues in food [11].…”