Strategies for organic pollutants analysis: a global overview to start your LC method development.

The detection and identification of unknown organic pollutants in complex environmental and household samples remains a significant challenge. This review focuses on the LC-MS analysis of three major classes of compounds: pesticides, household products, and colorants, which are often poorly analyzed by Gas Chromatography (GC) and benefit significantly from Liquid Chromatography (LC) analysis. This review aims to provide valuable insights into the development of robust and efficient LC methods for the untargeted analysis of complex environmental and household samples. Initiating LC method development for the analysis of unknown compounds can be challenging, as LC parameters must be adapted to a wide range of compounds while ensuring good resolution of similar pollutants. By analyzing a vast amount of literature, we have identified and classified key LC parameters, including stationary phase selection, mobile phase composition, gradient elution profiles, and detection methods, that are crucial for robust wide-range LC analysis. To illustrate the practical application of this bibliographic classification, we have extracted a consensus LC-MS method designed to emphasize broad applicability for the compounds of interest. As a proof of concept, this method has been successfully applied to a diverse set of model compounds, demonstrating its versatility and effectiveness even within complex and "dirty" samples.