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Simultaneous determination of six microplastics in drinking water by pyrolysis-gas chromatography/mass spectrometry

Analytical Methods 2026 Score: 40 ? 0–100 AI score estimating relevance to the microplastics field. Papers below 30 are filtered from public browse.
Mingming Yin, Jingli Fan, Gang Cheng, Qiaoying Chang, Bing Shao, Bing Shao, Ruobin Bai

Summary

Scientists developed an analytical method using pyrolysis-gas chromatography/mass spectrometry that can simultaneously detect and quantify six common types of microplastic in drinking water — including polyethylene, polypropylene, polystyrene, PET, PMMA, and PVC — with high sensitivity across a wide concentration range. Having a reliable, multi-polymer detection method is essential for monitoring drinking water safety and setting evidence-based regulatory limits.

Study Type Environmental

In our study, we have successfully established an analytical method capable of simultaneously detecting six key MPs in drinking water: polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), polystyrene (PS), polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) and polyvinylchloride (PVC), employing stainless steel membrane filtration to enrich the MPs in drinking water, and using pyrolysis-gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (Py-GC/MS) for qualitative and quantitative analysis of characteristic fragment ions produced after high-temperature pyrolysis. And the characteristic fragment ions for MPs are as follows: PMMA(100, 69, 41), PP(126, 70, 55), PVC(128, 127, 102), PET(182, 105, 77, 51), PE(82, 96) and PS(117, 91, 207). By optimizing the key instrument parameters and pretreatment steps, a wide linear range, a relatively low LOD of 0.012-0.40 µg L-1, and a limit of quantitation (LOQ) of 0.039-1.32 µg L-1 were ultimately achieved. The average recovery rate and relative standard deviation (RSD) were 69.73-111.21% and 2.78-12.56%, respectively. The method was applied and verified in the detection of 34 actual samples in different types of water, including groundwater, tap water, and bottled water. This study provides a solution for the quantitative detection of key MPs in drinking water.

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