Ampholine-functionalized hybrid organic–inorganic silica material as sorbent for solid-phase extraction of acidic and basic compounds

• An ampholine-functionalized hybrid organic–inorganic silica material was prepared as SPE adsorbent.
• The material showed excellent extraction efficiency for both acidic and basic compounds.
• The proposed material performance is comparable to and even better than commercial SPE sorbents.

A novel sorbent for solid-phase extraction (SPE) was synthesized by chemical immobilization of ampholine on hybrid organic–inorganic silica material. The ampholine-functionalized hybrid organic–inorganic silica sorbent is consisted of aliphatic amine groups, carboxyl groups and long carbon chains, allowing for extraction of both acidic and basic compounds. The retention properties of the developed sorbent were evaluated for 1-hydroxy-2-naphthoic acid (HNA), 1-naphthoic acid (NA), 3-hydroxybenzoic acid (HBA), benzoic acid (BA), sorbic acid (SA), vanillic aldehyde (VA), butyl 4-hydroxybenzoate (BHB), propyl 4-hydroxybenzoate (PHB), ethyl 4-hydroxybenzoate (EHB), and methyl 4-hydroxybenzoate (MHB). The results show that such a sorbent has three types of interaction, i.e., electrostatic interaction, hydrophobic interaction, and hydrogen bonding, exhibiting high extraction efficiency towards the compounds tested. The adsorption capacities of the analytes ranged from 0.61 to 6.54 μg mg−1. The reproducibility of the sorbent preparation was evaluated at three spiking concentration levels, with relative standard deviations (RSDs) of 1.0–10.5%. The recoveries of ten acidic and basic compounds spiked in beverage Coca-Cola® sample ranged from 82.5% to 98.2% with RSDs less than 5.8%. Under optimum conditions, the ampholine-functionalized hybrid organic–inorganic silica sorbent rendered higher extraction efficiency for acidic compounds than that of the commercially available ampholine-functionalized silica particles, and was comparable to that of the commercial Oasis WAX and Oasis WCX.