A Revisit to Effervescence-Assisted Microextraction of Non-Polar Organic Compounds Using Hydrophobic Magnetic Nanoparticles—Application to the Determination of UV Filters in Natural Waters

Abstract

In this work, we revisited the method of effervescence-assisted microextraction, aiming to assess the effects of the process of effervescence on the extraction efficiency of organic compounds. We used a magnetic nano-sorbent material composed of stearic acid-coated cobalt-ferrite magnetic nanoparticles as an adsorbent and dispersed it in water using 12 combinations of acid and base mixtures at two different mass ratios. The solution pH, the ionic strength, and the duration of effervescence were calculated and correlated to the extraction efficiency of nonpolar UV filters from aqueous samples as model organic compounds. Our findings provide a general perspective into the influence of the process of effervescence on extraction efficiency. Based on these findings, we developed and optimized a new analytical method for extracting UV filters from water samples using HPLC-UV as a detector. Under the optimum experimental conditions (0.2 g fumaric acid/0.1 g Na2CO3, 50 mg of magnetic nanoparticles and methanol as an elution solvent assisted by vortex agitation for 5 min) the method was found to afford good linearity in the calibration curves expanding by two orders of magnitude, satisfactory reproducibility and repeatability (1.8–11.1%), and high recoveries (78.4–127.1%). This research provides a new perspective on the influence of the process of effervescence on the extraction efficiency of nonpolar organic compounds and introduces a new method for extracting UV filters from aqueous media.

Keywords

• effervescence
• magnetic nanoparticles
• magnetic solid phase microextraction
• sunscreens
• environmental waters