Selective separation of arsenic species from aqueous solutions with immobilized macrocyclic material containing solid phase extraction columns.

A combination of solid phase extraction (SPE) columns was used for selective separation of water-soluble arsenic species: arsenite, arsenate, monomethylarsonic acid (MMA) and dimethylarsinic acid (DMA). The SPE columns, namely AnaLig TE-01 (TE-01), AnaLig AN-01 Si (AN-01) and AnaLig As-01 PA (As-01), contain immobilized macrocyclic material as the sorbent and commonly known as molecular recognition technology (MRT) gel. The retention, extraction and recovery behavior of the MRT gel SPE columns were studied at pH 4-10. Fortified deionized water spiked with 100 μM of arsenic species were treated at the flow rate of 0.2 mL min⁻¹. HNO₃ (1.0 and 6.0 M) was used as eluent to recover the retained arsenic species from TE-01 and AN-01 SPE columns. Arsenic species retained in the As-01 column were eluted with HNO₃ (0.1 M) followed by NaOH (2.0 M). Likely interference from the various coexisting ions (Na(+), K(+), Ca²(+), Mg²(+), Cl⁻, NO₃⁻, CH₃COO⁻, PO₄³⁻, SO₄²⁻, ClO₄⁻) (10 mM) were negligible. Quantitative separation of As(III), As(V), MMA and DMA was achieved based on the differences in extraction and recovery behavior of the MRT gel SPE columns with pH for different arsenic species. Complexation between arsenic species and MRT gel is the core phenomenon of the proposed technique as the complexation of MRT gels is expected to be stronger than the resin-based separation processes. MRT gel SPE columns are advantageous as compared with other reported SPE columns in terms of its performance with As(III). Effortless regeneration and unaltered separation performance of the sorbent materials for more than 100 loading and elution cycles are other sturdy characteristics to consider the MRT gel SPE columns for sensitive and selective arsenic species separation.