Solid phase microextraction combined with HPLC for determination of metal ions using crown ether as selective extracting reagent

A new solid phase microextraction (SPME) method for the analysis of metal ions in aqueous samples has been developed. Fibers doped with crown ether were used to extract mercury ions from aqueous solution through the formation of a stable complex. The complex is then desorbed from the fiber using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) for separation and UV detection. This newly developed SPME method for the extraction of metal ions from aqueous samples is possible to combine in-line with other more sensitive elemental detection methods such as Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (AAS), Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectrometry (ICP-AES), etc. The potential of SPME as a portable field sampling tool makes it a promising solvent-free sample preparation method for environmental field analysis.