Coupled chromatographic and mass-spectrometric techniques for the analysis of emerging pollutants in the aquatic environment

Abstract We present a comprehensive overview of recent developments in analytical chemistry for the most environmentally important groups of chemicals of emerging concern (CECs), including pharmaceuticals and personal-care products, pesticides, steroid hormones, perfluorinated compounds, alkylphenolethoxylates, bisphenol A and phthalates. Due to both the typically very low concentrations at which CECs occur and environmental samples being complex matrices demanding extensive extraction and clean-up procedures, very specific, sensitive analytical procedures are needed. In this context, we discuss state-of-the-art instrumentation for sample preconcentration, analyte separation and detection. We could observe several prominent trends: the common use of liquid chromatography (LC) to allow separation of CECs (instead of gas chromatography); the development and the application of multi-class methods; and, the increasing popularity of high-resolution, full-scan analysis, combined with a trend towards the use of sub-2-μm-particle sizes and high flow rates (ultra-high-performance LC). Overall, due to the recent advances in instrumentation, we could see significant progress in the analytical chemistry of CECs in environmental matrices.