Ligand displacement, headspace single-drop microextraction, and capillary electrophoresis for the determination of weak acid dissociable cyanide.

A new method involving ligand displacement, headspace single-drop microextraction (SDME) with in-drop derivatization and capillary electrophoresis (CE) was developed for the determination of weak acid dissociable (WAD) cyanide. WAD metal-cyanide complexes (Ag(CN)(2)(-), Cd(CN)(4)(2-), Cu(CN)(3)(2-), Hg(CN)(2), Hg(CN)(4)(2-), Ni(CN)(4)(2-) and Zn(CN)(4)(2-)) are decomposed with ligand-displacing reagent and the released hydrogen cyanide is extracted from neutral solution (pH 6.5) with an aqueous microdrop (5 microl) containing Ni(II)-NH(3) as derivatization agent. The hydrogen cyanide extracted reacts with Ni(2+) to form a stable and highly UV absorbing tetracyanonickelate anion which is then determined by CE. Among the three different ligand-displacing reagents (i.e., ethylenediamine, dithizone and polyethileneimine) studied none of the reagents used alone releases cyanide completely from all WAD cyanide complexes. Complete recoveries were obtained by the extraction of WAD cyanide from 0.4 mol l(-1) ethylenediamine chloride buffer (pH 6.5) containing 0.001% (wt) dithizone. Proposed system was applied to determine WAD cyanide in industrial wastewater and river waters samples with spiked recoveries in the range of 95.8-104.7%.

Headspace single-drop microextraction with in-drop derivatization and capillary electrophoretic determination for free cyanide analysis.

A new method involving headspace single-drop microextraction (SDME) with in-drop derivatization and CE is developed for the preconcentration and determination of free cyanide. An aqueous microdrop (5 microL) containing Ni(II)-NH(3) (as derivatization agent), sodium carbonate and ammonium pyromellitate (as internal standard) was used as the acceptor phase. The extracted cyanide forms a stable Ni(CN)(4) (2-) complex which is then determined by CE. Common experimental parameters (sample and acceptor phase pH, extraction temperature, extraction time and sample ionic strength) affecting the extraction efficiency were investigated. Using headspace SDME, free cyanide can be effectively extracted from the neutral solutions, i.e. without the acidification of the sample which often is prone to errors due to incomplete liberation and artefactual cyanide production. Proposed SDME-CE method provided about 58-fold enrichment in 20 min. The calibration curve was linear for concentrations of CN(-) in the range from 0.25 to 20 micromol/L (R(2) = 0.997). The LOD (S/N = 3) was estimated to be 0.08 micromol/L of CN(-). Such a detection sensitivity is high enough for free cyanide determination in common environmental and physiological samples. Finally, headspace SDME was applied to determine free cyanide in human saliva and urine samples with spiked recoveries in the range of 91.7-105.6%. The main advantage of this method is that sample clean-up, preconcentration and derivatization procedures can be completed in a single step. In addition, the proposed technique does not require any sample pretreatment and thus is much less susceptible to interferences compared to existing methods.

Characterization of the SDS-induced electroosmotic flow in micellar electrokinetic chromatography with cationic polyelectrolyte-coated capillaries.

Manipulation of the EOF is essential for achieving optimal separations by MEKC. In this paper, we present an extensive investigation of the effect of common experimental conditions on the EOF observed in a capillary coated with poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride) (PDADMA) polyelectrolyte under MEKC conditions. It was found that highly reproducible cathodal EOF is achieved approximately at or just below the conditional CMC value of SDS in the electrolytes used. At concentrations of SDS greater than the CMC the EOF is independent of pH. The impact of common organic modifiers (ACN, methanol, urea, beta-CD and nonionic surfactant) on the EOF behavior in both a PDADMA-coated capillary and a bare silica capillary is compared. The suppressing effect of organic modifiers on the EOF is much stronger for coated capillary indicating that these compounds additionally reduce the negative charge density on the capillary surface due to alteration of the surfactant coating.

Micellar electrokinetic chromatography at low pH with polyelectrolyte-coated capillaries.

The performance of capillaries coated with a poly(diallyldimethylammonium) (PDADMA) monolayer or poly(diallyldimethylammonium)-poly(styrenesulfonate) bilayer was investigated and compared under micellar electrokinetic chromatographic (MEKC) conditions. Both monolayer (positively charged) and bilayer (negatively charged) coatings with micellar (sodium dodecyl sulfate) electrolyte generated very stable and pH-independent cathodal electroosmotic flow (EOF). From the results obtained, it can be concluded that in a doubly coated capillary the second poly(styrenesulfonate) layer is replaced by sodium dodecyl sulfate micelles during flushing with micellar electrolyte. Consequently, in order to obtain a stable and pH-independent cathodal electroosmotic flow for the MEKC separations, the capillary coating with the second polyanion layer is not necessary. The importance of the PDADMA coating was illustrated by comparing MEKC separations of the common developing agents (hydroquinone, phenidone, pyrocatechol, pyrogallol and quinone) on a bare uncoated capillary with the coated capillary. The coating provides reproducible MEKC separations at low pH (pH 3.0) with relative standard deviation (R.S.D.) values for migration times and peak areas lower than 0.45 and 3.3%, respectively. Good linearities in the range from 5 x 10(-5) to 2 x 10(-3) mol l(-1) were obtained for all five compounds, with correlation coefficients higher than 0.998. The detection limits were in the range from 5 x 10(-6) mol l(-1) for pyrocatechol to 2 x 10(-5) mol l(-1) for quinone. The proposed MEKC system was applied to the determination of hydroquinone and phenidone in X-ray photographic developer solutions.