On-line solid phase extraction coupled to high performance liquid chromatography for the determination of organotin compounds in water samples

On-line solid phase extraction (SPE) coupled to the high performance liquid chromatography was applied for the determination of tetraphenyltin (TrPhT), tetraethyltin (TrET), and tetrabutyltin (TrBT) in water samples. Organotin compounds (OTs) were on-line enriched on an Agilent C-18 short column, separated in the isocratic mode on an Agilent C-8 column. The mobile phase of methanol/water (V/V, 90/10) (0.05% trifluoroacetic acid) at flow rate of 1 ml/min was used. Under the experimental conditions, the detection limits of TrPhT, TrET and TrBT are 1.7, 7.3 and 7.3 mu g/L, respectively. The quantitative extraction of three organotin compounds was achieved with recoveries ranging from 80.8% to 90.1%, and the relative standard derivation ranging from 2.9% to 9.3%. The results obtained by the proposed method are satisfactory for the determination of OTs in water samples.