SOLID-PHASE EXTRACTION AND GAS-CHROMATOGRAPHIC MASS-SPECTROMETRIC DETERMINATION AFTER HYDROLYSIS OF 2-AMINOFLUORENE HEMOGLOBIN ADDUCTS IN BLOOD OF RATS

2-Nitrofluorene is an environmental pollutant that binds covalently to haemoglobin after nitroreduction and successive N-hydroxylation. Thes e haemoglobin adducts can be cleaved in vitro by mild base-catalysed h ydrolysis. For the enrichment of arylamines from the aqueous hydrolysa te, an extraction procedure with an organic solvent is widely used. Be cause of the formation of a thick emulsion layer between the aqueous a nd organic solvent layers, the extraction is laborious and inefficient . The use of Amberlite XAD2 provides a simple extraction procedure yie lding a recovery of ca. 70%. Calibration curves in haemoglobin solutio n were prepared with a correlation coefficient of 0.998 (n = 12). The inter-day coefficient of variation amounted to 14%.