On-line combination of aqueous-sample preparation and capillary gas chromatography

An overview is presented of methods currently in use to combine the preparation of aqueous samples on-line with capillary gas chromatography. Two approaches can be distinguished: heartcut-orientated reversed-phase liquid chromatography-gas chromatography (GC) and analyte-isolation-orientated analyte extraction-GC. These approaches either use techniques in which water is directly introduced onto the GC column, or an indirect approach in which water is eliminated, i.e., by solid-phase extraction, solid-phase microextraction or liquid-liquid extraction, prior to introduction of the analytes onto the GC column. The latter type of approach is much more successful and user friendly, and many applications have been reported. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.