A novel long path length absorbance spectroscopy for the determination of ultra trace organophosphorus pesticides in vegetables and fruits

A simple, rapid, sensitive and reproducible spectrophotometry for determination of ultra trace organophosphorus pesticides (OPs) with liquid core waveguide light intensity technique is presented. OPs were degraded into phosphate with UV light, potassium peroxydisulphate as oxidant and nanosized titanium dioxide as catalyst. Under the optimum selected conditions, linear light intensity response was obtained in the range of 2.0 x 10(-11) to 8.0 x 10(-10) g mL(-1) phosphate, and the limit of detection (LOD) 6.7 x 10(-12) g mL(-1) was achieved. Both the low limit of linear range and the LOD of the proposed method were lower over 1000-fold than that of classical spectrophotometry. The proposed method was applied to the determination of ultra trace OPs in vegetables and fruits samples. (C) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.