Application of liquid-phase microextraction and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry for the determination of chloroform in drinking water.

In this paper, a novel method for the determination of chloroform in drinking water has been described. It is based on liquid-phase microextraction (LPME) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Extraction conditions such as solvent selection, organic solvent dropsize, stirring rate, content of NaCl and extraction time were found to have significant influence on extraction efficiency. The optimized conditions were 1.5 microl xylene, 20 min extraction time at 400 rpm stirring rate without NaCl addition. The linear range was 1.0 - 100 microg l(-1) for chloroform. The limit of detection (LOD) was 1.0 microg l(-1); and relative standard deviation (RSD) at the 30 microg l(-1) level was 2.9%. Tap water samples from a laboratory were successfully analyzed using the proposed method. The relative recovery of spiked water samples was 104%.