Facile synthesis of thiocyano-functionalized dendritic mesoporous silica spheres for efficient extraction of eugenol anesthetics from aquatic products

Abstract

In this work, thiocyano-functionalized monodisperse dendritic mesoporous silica microspheres (DMS-SCN) were successfully synthesized and utilized as efficient solid-phase extraction adsorbents for the enrichment of eugenol anesthetics in aquatic products. The thiocyano functionalization significantly improves the adsorption capacity of the adsorbent for the four eugenol anesthetics from 723–1092 μg g⁻¹ to 2180–3885 μg g⁻¹ in virtue of the reinforced permanent dipole interactions, π-π stacking interactions, and electrostatic interactions. By coupling DMS-SCN based solid phase extraction with HPLC (SPE-HPLC) method, an analytical method for determination of eugenol anesthetics in tilapia, carp and shrimp was successfully developed. This method achieves low detection limits ranging from 0.32 ng mL⁻¹ to 0.82 ng mL⁻¹ and exhibits a wide linear range from 1 ng mL⁻¹ to 200ng mL⁻¹. The recoveries for the four eugenol anesthetics range from 85.16 % to 109.1 %, with relative standard deviations between 1.18 % and 8.37 %. The method demonstrates minimal matrix effects and high accuracy. The DMS-SCN based SPE-HPLC method is anticipated to be a valuable tool for the analysis of eugenol anesthetics in complex sample matrices.