Analytical method for the determination of chlorinated paraffins in environmental samples using GC-ECNI-ion trap-MS

Chlorinated paraffins (CPs), a group of emerging pollutants, have attracted growing attention in the past years. It was shown in recent studies that short and medium-chain chlorinated paraffins are widely distributed in the environment of many countries. The first screening using the short-column GC-ECNI-MS confirmed the presence of short-chain chlorinated paraffins in the Czech environment. However, the information about the environmental levels and behavior of CPs is still limited, partially because a simple and cheap analytical method for CP determination is not available. In this study, the original method was simplified and adapted for the mass spectrometer with an ion trap analyzer. This modified method was tested with CP-enriched sediments, and proved to be suitable for determination of both, short and medium-chain CPs in environmental samples. Extraction, clean-up procedure, final GC-ECNI-IT-MS analysis, and spectra interpretation are described in this paper.