ABSTRACT

Pesticides are an integral part of agriculture today, but their use can lead to negative health effects, potential problems that cause a wide array of countries to pay much attention to their residues. It is expected that residues present at trace levels need a very sensitive technique that can quantify them at very low limits. Chromatography and mass spectrometry techniques have shown advantages in achieving a rapid detection of target analytes from complex samples with high efficiency and robust qualitative and quantitative determinations. The analysis of hundreds of pesticides in food, agricultural products and environmental samples, and the screening of unknown pesticides, metabolites and chiral separation can be achieved with these techniques. This chapter summarizes and reviews mass spectrometry technology, new development of chromatography–mass spectrometry, such as two-dimensional gas chromatography–time of flight mass spectrometer, supercritical fluid chromatography–mass spectrometry (SFC–MS), and the typical example applications for pesticide detection. Chromatography–mass spectrometry has become the mainstream technology for pesticide residue analysis.