Polydimethylsiloxane/metal-organic frameworks coated stir bar sorptive extraction coupled to high performance liquid chromatography-ultraviolet detector for the determination of estrogens in environmental water samples

• Various MOFs were synthesized and employed as SBSE coating for selective extraction of estrogens.
• A method of PDMS/IRMOF-3 SBSE-LD-HPLC-UV was developed for environmental water analysis.
• The method provided low LODs, high extraction efficiency and wide linear range.

In this work, three kinds of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), MOF-5, MOF-199 and IRMOF-3, were introduced in stir bar sorptive extraction (SBSE) and novel polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)/MOFs (including PDMS/MOF-5, PDMS/MOF-199 and PDMS/IRMOF-3) coated stir bars were prepared by sol–gel technique. These PDMS/MOFs coatings were characterized and critically compared for the extraction of seven target estrogens (17-β-estradiol, dienestrol, diethylstilbestrol, estrone, 4-t-octylphenol, bisphenol-A and 17α-ethynylestradiol) by SBSE, and the results showed that PDMS/IRMOF-3 exhibited highest extraction efficiency. Based on the above facts, a novel method of PDMS/IRMOF-3 coating SBSE-high performance liquid chromatography ultraviolet (HPLC-UV) detection was developed for the determination of seven target estrogens in environmental waters. Several parameters affecting extraction of seven target estrogens by SBSE (PDMS/IRMOF-3) including extraction time, stirring rate, pH, ionic strength, desorption solvent and desorption time were investigated. Under the optimal experimental conditions, the limits of detection (LODs, S/N = 3) were found to be in the range of 0.15–0.35 μg/L. The linear range was 2–2500 μg/L for 17α-ethynylestradiol and 1–2500 μg/L for other estrogens. The relative standard deviations (RSDs) were in the range of 3.7–9.9% (n = 8, c = 20 μg/L) and the enrichment factors were from 30.3 to 55.6-fold (theoretical enrichment factor was 100-fold). The proposed method was successfully applied to the analysis of estrogens in environmental water samples, and quantitative recoveries were obtained for the spiking experiments.