SUPERCRITICAL-FLUID EXTRACTION AS A USEFUL METHOD FOR PESTICIDES DETERMINATION

Supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) has faced a growing interest in t he past few years, due to its numerous advantages over classical liqui d solvent extractions (mainly rapidity, selectivity, low solvent volum es required). In particular, applications of this technique have been reported for the determination of pesticides in complex matrices, such as soils and sediments, water samples (after a solid-phase extraction ), plant materials, animal tissues, and food items. In fact, SFE of pe sticides represents quite a challenge due to the wide range of polarit y encountered and the variety of matrices that may contain those resid ues. Consequently, extraction parameters need to be carefully chosen. So, this paper details the main strategies possible for efficient extr actions of pesticides from several matrices.