H. Zahradnickova et al., DETERMINATION OF ATRAZINE AND SIMAZINE IN DRINKING AND SURFACE WATERSBY SOLID-PHASE EXTRACTION AND HIGH-PERFORMANCE THIN-LAYER CHROMATOGRAPHY, Journal of chromatography, 688(1-2), 1994, pp. 383-389
A simple high-performance thin layer chromatographic (HPTLC) method ha
s been developed for the determination of atrazine and simazine herbic
ides in drinking and surface waters. The method involves solid-phase e
xtraction on C-18 Bakerbond cartridges followed by development of the
concentrated extracts on HPTLC silica plates with a nitromethane-tetra
chloromethane (1:1, v/v) mobile phase and quantitation by UV scanning
densitometry. Using the proposed mobile phase composition, pronounced
background suppression on the chromatograms of the real water samples
was accomplished. The detection limits of the method were 30 and 60 ng
/l for atrazine and simazine, respectively, at the 80-400 ng/l fortifi
cation level in the surface waters. The method was successfully applie
d to the analyses of tap and surface waters with overall recoveries be
tween 58 and 93% and a relative standard deviation below 12%. The resu
lts show, that the HPTLC method is sufficiently selective and sensitiv
e to be employed in screening of contaminated waters containing the tr
iazines below the maximum residues limits of the European Community.