Abstract: This paper describes the development of an analytical methodology to determine diphenylamine (DPA) in surface waters using molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) as extraction and pre-concentration material, followed by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). A new molecularly imprinted polymer, prepared following a non-covalent approach, was synthesised using DPA as the template molecule, methacrylic acid as functional monomer, ethylene glycol dimethacrylate as cross-linker. The imprinting effect of the polymer was verified by chromatographic evaluation. The polymer exhibited high adsorption capacity and good selective ability. A method for determination of trace DPA was developed using this polymer as enrichment sorbent coupled with high performance liquid chromatography focusing on surface water samples. Under the optimum experimental conditions, the DPA standard is linear within the concentration range studied, that is, from 0.1μg mL-1 to 1μg mL-1 (r2 = 0.9869). Lower limits of detection (LOD) were 0.02μg mL-1. Recoveries and relative standard deviation (RSD, n = 4) values for precision in the developed method were 91% and 3.0%. It was demonstrated that the proposed MI-SPE-HPLC method could be applied to direct determination of DPA in surface water.
Template and target information: diphenylamine, DPA
Author keywords: Diphenylamine, molecularly imprinted polymer, solid phase extraction