Abstract:

The complexity of environment together with wide range of pollutants produced by several types of industries make environmental samples (surface waters and air) the most complicated ones. Thus, the determination of target or identification of unknown organic environmental pollutants requires use of powerful ****ytical methods with high separation efficiency.Comprehensive gas chromatography connected to mass spectrometric detector overcome limitations of ordinary gas chromatography by multiplying its separation power and enabled baseline separation of thousands of compounds present in sample in single ****ytical run. However, the toxicity of environmental pollutants varies and maximum allowed concentration of particular pollutant is often determined by legislation, and in many cases, the most toxic compounds should be present only at very low concentration of less than at ppt levels. In order to determine such low concentrations, an effective sample treatment methods must be applied. The most commonly used extraction methods in routine laboratories for effective pre-concentration of these compounds are liquid–liquid extraction and solid phase extraction. Over past decade,novelsorptive solvent-less sample treatment methods were developed that utilize various type of polymeric materials for extraction of environmental pollutants. The advantages and limitation of comprehensive gas chromatography and novel sample treatment methods such as SBSE, passive samplers, and monolithic extraction will be discussed in detail.