Hyphenated Techniques in Environmental Speciation Analysis

The recognition of the fact that the chemical, biological and toxicological properties of an element are critically dependent on the form in which the element occurs in the sample has spurred a rapid development of an area of analytical chemistry referred to as speciation analysis [1]. A fundamental tool used for speciation studies is the combination of a chromatographic separation technique, that ensures that the analyte compound leaves the column unaccompanied by other species of the analyte element, with atomic spectrometry, permitting a sensitive and specific detection of the target element. Recent advances in the application of these hyphenated (coupled) techniques for species-selective determination of : (i) volatile organo-metallic (Sn, Hg, Pb) anthropogenic contaminants and (ii) non-volatile organometalloid (As, Se) compounds and heavy metal complexes in environmental matrices are discussed. . Particular attention is given to the limitations related to chromatographic signal identification due to unavailability of standards for many species since a large number of the naturally synthesized compounds have not yet been identified and characterized. The potential of molecular mass spectrometry for this purpose is demonstrated.