Publication
Title
Profiling cocaine residues and pyrolytic products in wastewater by mixed‐mode liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry
Author
Abstract
This work provides a new analytical method for the determination of cocaine, its metabolites benzoylecgonine and cocaethylene, the pyrolytic products anhydroecgonine and anhydroecgonine methyl ester and the pharmaceutical levamisole in wastewater. Samples were solid‐phase extracted and extracts analyzed by liquid chromatography‐tandem mass spectrometry using, for the first time in the illicit drug field, a stationary phase that combines reversed‐phase and weak cation‐exchange functionalities. The overall method performance was satisfactory, with limits of detection below 1 ng/L, relative standard deviations below 21% and percentages of recovery between 93% and 121%. Analysis of 24‐h composite raw wastewater samples collected in Santiago de Compostela (Spain) and Brasilia (Brazil) highlighted benzoylecgonine as the compound showing the highest population‐normalized mass loads (300‐1000 mg/day/1000 inhabitants). In Brasilia, cocaine and levamisole loads underwent an upsurge on Sunday, indicating a high consumption, and likely a direct disposal, of cocaine powder on this day. Conversely, the pyrolytic product resulting from the smoke of crack, anhydroecgonine methyl ester, and its metabolite anhydroecgonine were relatively stable over the four days, agreeing with a not recreational‐associated use of crack.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Drug testing and analysis. - -
Publication
2019
ISSN
1942-7603 [print]
1942-7611 [online]
DOI
10.1002/DTA.2590
Volume/pages
11 :7 (2019) , p. 1018-1027
ISI
000474707500011
Pubmed ID
30891957
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (open access)
Full text (publisher's version - intranet only)
UAntwerpen
Research group
Publication type
Subject
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 24.08.2021
Last edited 24.08.2024
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