A chemical potential driven micro-membrane sampler and its application for the determination of trace carbonyl compounds in air

A chemical potential driven micro-membrane sampler for enrichment of trace gaseous carbonyl compounds has been developed. The sampler is composed of exposed parts with membrane and analysis parts with polypropylene tube. The membrane acts as a barrier, through which the analytes dynamically diffuse and transfer from absorbents present outside to extract solvent inside through the difference of chemical potential. Formaldehyde and acetic acid were selected as verification samples. Quantification is achieved through high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis. The mass of analytes determined shows a linear correlation with concentration of the gaseous analytes. The limits of detection of formaldehyde and acetic acid after 8 h sampling were 3.32 and 0.76 μg m−3.