Phenyltrichlorosilane-functionalized magnesium oxide microspheres: Preparation, characterization and application for the selective extraction of dioxin-like polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in soils with matrix solid-phase dispersion

•Phenyltrichlorosilane modified magnesium oxide microsphere (PTS-MgO) was presented.•PTS-MgO was used for a new sorbent material in matrix solid-phase dispersion.•The sorbent showed high selectivity for DL-PAHs with satisfactory recoveries obtained.•The method was applied to the extraction of dioxin-like PAHs from soil samples.

Magnesium oxide microspheres functionalized with phenyltrichlorosilane (PTS-MgO) were synthesized by surface modification through silanization reaction, which was confirmed by Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetry analysis (TGA) and N2 adsorption-desorption. The result indicated that PTS-MgO not only possessed the ability of enhancing the retention with PAHs, but also weakening the interference from chlorinated compounds. As a sorbent for the matrix solid-phase dispersion (MSPD) extraction, PTS-MgO was used to selectively extract seven dioxin-like polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (DL-PAHs) from soil samples. Various parameters affecting the recoveries of seven DL-PAHs were investigated and optimized, such as sorbent/sample mass ratio, grinding time, rinsing and eluting conditions. Under the optimized conditions, the developed method combining MSPD with HPLC-FLD exhibited good sensitivity (0.02-0.12 ng g−1 detection of limits) and linearity (linear correlation coefficient greater than 0.9997). Satisfactory recoveries with DL-PAHs spiked at two levels (10 and 80 ng g−1) were obtained in the range of 72.2-113.1% with RSD < 9.6%, indicating that PTS-MgO had a potential in MSPD extraction of DL-PAHs in soils. Additionally, the proposed MSPD-HPLC-FLD method was also verified by detecting seven DL-PAHs in the standard reference soil. Based on the developed method, DL-PAHs in soil samples were detected with the concentration ranging from 70.08 to 555.05 ng g−1 dry weight (dw). The total toxic equivalency quotients (TEQ) of seven DL-PAHs varied from 9.93 to 143.94 ng TEQ/g dw.

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