Substrateless graphene fiber: A sorbent for solid-phase microextraction

In current study, a substrateless graphene fiber was successfully prepared by a simple hydrothermal strategy and used as solid-phase microextraction (SPME) sorbent. Five organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) were employed as model analytes to evaluate the performance of as-prepared graphene fiber. The results showed that the graphene fiber exhibited higher extraction efficiencies, higher thermal stability (up to 310 °C), better reproducibility, and longer service life (more than 180 times reuse) than commercial fibers. In addition, the method for the determination of OCPs was proposed by coupling headspace (HS)-SPME technique with gas chromatography/electron capture detector (HS-SPME-GC/ECD). The proposed HS-SPME-GC/ECD method showed low limits of detection (0.83–11.5 ng/L), wide linear dynamic ranges (more than 2 orders of magnitude), and acceptable reproducibility (RSD < 10.9%). Finally, the proposed method was successfully applied to the analysis of OCPs in environmental water samples with good recoveries (81–121%) and satisfactory precisions (RSD < 9%).

► A graphene fiber was successfully prepared by a simple hydrothermal strategy.
► The graphene fiber was used as sorbent of solid-phase microextraction.
► The graphene fiber exhibited higher thermal stability and longer lifetime than commercial fibers.
► The graphene fiber shows higher enrichment capability for OCPs than PDMS fiber.
► The graphene fiber was used to determine OCPs in environmental water samples.