Abstract

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A novel method for determination of 2, 4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D) was developed by using salting-out assisted liquid–liquid extraction (SALLE) via water-miscible acetonitrile as the extractant coupled with ultraviolet visible spectrophotometry. SALLE conditions, including volume of salting-out solvent, the pH of sample solution and salting-out solvent as variable factors. The optimal salting-out parameters were obtained as follows: 2 mL of acetonitrile was added to 2 mL of sample solution with pH = 2 and then 6 mL salting-out solvent containing 5 mol/L sodium chloride at a pH of 2 was added to the solution for extraction. This procedure afforded a convenient and cost-saving operation for 2,4-D, such as good linear relationships (R = 0.9979) between absorbance and concentration from 2.5 μg/mL to 25 μg/mL, low limits of detection (0.75 μg/mL). The method recoveries obtained at fortified three concentrations for two water samples ranged from 83% to 100%.

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