Development of Pressurized Extraction and Cleanup for PFAS Analysis of Tissue Samples

Abstract

The scientific community has become increasingly aware of the prevalent risks that per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) pose to the environment. PFAS are known to bioaccumulate, leading to their persistence throughout daily life. Environmental solid matrices, such as soils, biosolids, and tissues pose an additional challenge: complex extraction and cleanup steps are required to overcome matrix interferences, further complicating method development, standardization, and data consistency. Methods typically employ a solvent extraction followed by a separate cleanup protocol in order to isolate PFAS analytes of interest. This multi-step process can be time-consuming, inconsistent, and susceptible to human error. To address these limitations, a fully automated system was developed utilizing INTEC Technology™. This work details the extraction, cleanup, and filtration of fish tissue in under fifteen minutes, enabling automated preparation followed directly by LC-MS/MS analysis. To demonstrate system performance, fish tissue samples were prepared for automated extraction coupled with in-situ cleanup. LC-MS/MS analysis of the resulting extracts displayed good recoveries and reproducibility for native compounds and extracted internal standards (EIS). These results suggest that this method enables a fast, reliable, and scalable workflow suitable for high-throughput PFAS testing laboratories.