Use of Microemulsions for Tetraphenyltin Determination by High-Performance Liquid Chromatography with Spectrophotometric Detection

Using an example of tetraphenyltin (TePT), a new method is developed and tested for the isolation and preconcentration of toxic organometallic compounds from soils. It consists in the preconcentration of the target component in an organic layer formed after the splitting of a microemulsion (ME), followed by the determination of TePT by reversed-phase HPLC with spectrophotometric detection. The dependence of the TePT concentration factor in the organic layer formed after the splitting of the ME on the composition of the ME is studied. It is found that, in using a ME of the composition sodium dodecyl sulfate–n-hexane–n-butanol–water (3 : 1.5 : 6 : 89.5, by volume), the concentration factor is maximal and equal to 10. The limit of detection for TePT is 0.1 ng/mL.