Simultaneous determination of 102 pesticide residues in Chinese teas by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry

An efficient and sensitive method for simultaneous determination of 102 pesticide residues in teas has been established and validated. The multi-residue analysis of the pesticides in teas involved extraction with acetone–ethyl acetate–hexane, clean-up using gel permeation chromatography (GPC) and solid-phase extraction (SPE), and subsequent identification and quantification of the selected pesticides by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) under retention time locked (RTL) conditions. For most of the target analytes, the optimized pretreatment processes led to no significant interference on analysis from sample matrix, and the determination of 102 compounds was achieved in about 120 min. Pesticide residues could be determined in low sub-ppb range, from 0.01 μg/mL for hexachlorobenzene to 2.5 μg/mL for propargite, with average recoveries ranging from 59.7 to 120.9% (mean 88%) and relative standard deviations (RSDs) in the range 3.0–20.8% (mean 13.7%) for all analytes across three fortification tea levels. The limits of detection (LODs) were much lower than the maximum residue levels established by the European Union (EU) legislations.