Determination of sulfonylurea herbicides in water by capillary electrophoresis and by liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry.

A capillary electrophoresis (CE) method and an electrospray ionization (ESI) liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) confirmatory method were developed to analyze 12 sulfonylurea herbicides and one sulfonamide (Flumetsulam) in runoff water. The water used for fortification was collected from a local marsh that contained high levels of potentially interfering compounds. Good recoveries and adequate sensitivity at the 0.2 ppb level (limit of quantitation) were obtained. A portion of the water was acidified and extracted with reversed-phase solid-phase extraction (SPE). Extracts were cleaned up with a tandem system consisting of a strong-anion exchange SPE cartridge stacked on an alumina SPE cartridge. CE/ultraviolet quantitation was achieved by capillary zone electrophoresis at pH 4.75 with 50 mM ammonium acetate buffer and an acetonitrile modifier. ESI LC/MS quantitation was achieved by using a time-scheduled selective-ion monitoring (positive mode) of the M + H ions for each compound. The extraction/cleanup procedure provided extracts such that in-source collision-induced dissociation gave product ions for confirmation at the 0.2 ppb fortification level.