The LC-MS/MS analysis of pyrethroid insecticides and some other non-polar contaminants

Pyrethroid insecticides have very low solubility in water and consequently are rarely detected in river or groundwater samples. However, we often detect these contaminants in sediments.

Organic contaminants are extracted from soils or sediments with organic solvents using an accelerated solvent extractor (ASE, Dionex).

Instrument: QTRAP 6500+ mass spectrometer (Sciex) coupled with Nexera binary UPLC (Shimadzu). The mass spectrometer was operated in positive ESI scheduled MRM mode. Chromatographic separations were carried out using the Luna Omega Polar-C18 column (2.1×150 mm, 3 µm particle size, Phenomenex) using a linear gradient of methanol/water (with 0.1% formic acid and 5 mM ammonium formate). The instrument was controlled and data were analyzed using Analyst and MultiQuant software respectively (Sciex).