Sensitive determination of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) in water and milk by effervescence-enhanced switchable hydrophilic-hydrophobic solvent-based salting-out microextraction and high-performance liquid chromatography with photodiode array detection (HPLC-PDA)

Here is reported effervescent reaction-enhanced switchable hydrophilic-hydrophobic solvent-based salting-out microextraction (ERSSM) with high-performance liquid chromatography with photodiode array detection (HPLC-PDA) for the preconcentration, extraction, and trace-level determination of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) in milk and water. The important variables were rigorously optimized to be 150 µL of hexanoic acid as the extraction solvent, 400 µL of Na2CO3 as the alkaline source, 350 µL of H2SO4 solution as the acid source, and NaCl as the salting-out agent. The optimized conditions provided a linear range from 0.2 to 50 µg L−1 with limits of detection and quantitation from 0.026 to 0.085 µg L−1 and 0.087 to 0.28 µg L−1 for six PBDEs. The intra-day and inter-day precision values were from 2.48% to 6.75%, and the fortified recoveries for PBDEs were between 78.06% and 103.07% in water and milk samples. The developed procedure avoids the use of a traditional organic disperser and mechanical mixing allowing the determination of PBDEs outdoors by synchronous extraction method and high efficiency for the analytes. These advantages suggest a high potential for the routine monitoring of PBDEs in liquid food and environmental samples.