Determination of Henry's law coefficients by combination of the equilibrium partitioning in closed systems and solid-phase microextraction techniques

This paper describes the determination of Henry's law coefficients by means of the EPICS (equilibrium partitioning in closed systems) technique in com bination with SPME (solid-phase microextraction). The use of solid-phase mi croextraction-sampling allowed us to extend the possibilities of the equili brium partitioning in closed systems technique with respect to the range of Henry's law coefficients which can be measured. Whereas the equilibrium pa rtitioning in closed systems technique is limited to determine air-water eq uilibrium partitioning of volatile compounds with Henry's law coefficients of at least 0.06 (dimensionless), the current method allowed to measure coe fficients between 0.0023 and 13.5. In this way Henry's law coefficients of 20 compounds, being in a range covering five orders of magnitude, were meas ured with relative standard deviations between 1.0 and 19.8% (mean standard deviation: 5.7%; median of standard deviations: 4.8%, n=99). Several types of compounds were examined i.e. aliphatic hydrocarbons, monocyclic and pol ycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, chlorinated and fluorinated compounds, ether s and esters, biphenyl and N-containing compounds, including compounds for which availability of experimental Henry's law coefficients is limited. Mea surement of the equilibrium partitioning in the 2 to 25 degrees C range all owed to establish relations of Henry's law coefficient as a function of tem perature. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.