ABSTRACT
This chapter briefly discusses the application, chemical properties and physical properties of acrylonitrile. It presents detailed information on the air analysis and analysis of aqueous and nonaqueous samples of acrylonitrile. Acrylonitrile is readily soluble in alcohol and ether, flammable and toxic. During the analysis of aqueous and nonaqueous samples of acrylonitrile, aqueous samples are extracted by the purge and trap method. The volatile analyte is thermally desorbed from the trap and swept onto a gas chromatography (GC) column for separation, and detected by flame ionization detector (FID), nitrogen–phosphorus detector (NPD), or by a mass spectrometer (MS). Aqueous samples or aqueous extracts of nonaqueous samples are directly injected onto a C-18 reverse phase column for high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis with UV detection at 195 nm. During the air analysis of acrylonitrile, air is drawn over carbon molecular sieve in a cartridge.
