Hindawi Publishing Corporation ISRN Analytical Chemistry Volume 2013, Article ID 357807, 6 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/357807 Research Article Micelle-Mediated Extraction Prior to LC-UV for Preconcentration and Determination of Trace Amounts of Bisphenol A in Environmental Samples Naghi Saadatjou, 1 Shahab Shariati, 2 and Mostafa Golshekan 1 1 Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences, Semnan University, Semnan, Iran 2 Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences, Rasht Branch, Islamic Azad University, Rasht, Iran Correspondence should be addressed to Shahab Shariati; shariaty@iaurasht.ac.ir Received 27 March 2013; Accepted 16 April 2013 Academic Editors: C. Desiderio, R. K. Jyothi, J. J. Santana Rodriguez, and A. Taga Copyright © 2013 Naghi Saadatjou et al. Tis is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. A simple and high sensitive preconcentration method based on micelle-mediated extraction followed by high performance liquid chromatography (LC-UV) was developed for preconcentration and determination of trace amounts of bisphenol A (BPA) in aqueous samples. Te BPA was quantitatively extracted from aqueous samples in the presence of Triton X-114 as a nonionic surfactant and preconcentrated into the small volume (about 30 L) of the surfactant-rich phase. Taguchi method, an orthogonal array design (OA 16 (4 5 )), was utilized to optimize the various factors afecting the micellar extraction of BPA. Te maximum extraction efciency of BPA was obtained at pH 3, 0.2% (w/v) Triton X-114, and 0.25molL −1 sodium acetate. For the preconcentration, the solutions were incubated in a thermostatic water bath at 50 ∘ C for 7 min. Afer centrifuge and separation of aqueous phase, the surfactant-rich phase was diluted with 100 L acetone and injected in the chromatographic system. Under the optimum conditions, preconcentration factor of 34.9 was achieved for extraction from 10mL of sample solution and the relative standard deviation (RSD%) of the method was lower than 6.6%. Te calibration curve was linear in the range of 0.5–150 gL −1 with reasonable linearity ( 2 > 0.9987). Te limit of detection (LOD) based on / = 3 was 0.13 gL −1 for 10 mL sample volumes. Te limit of quantifcation (LOQ) based on / = 10 was 0.43 gL −1 for 10 mL sample volumes. Finally, the applicability of the proposed method was evaluated by the extraction and determination of BPA in the real samples, and satisfactory results were obtained. 1. Introduction Te distribution and abundance of plastic particles in the environment have rapidly increased, and the adverse efects of chemicals that leach from the plastic debris on aquatic animals have been of great concern [1, 2]. It is well known that 4,4-(1-methylethylidene) bisphenol or 2,2-(4,4- dihydroxydiphenyl) propane (commonly named bisphenol A; BPA) has estrogenic activity [3, 4]. BPA is a monomer widely used in the manufacture of epoxy and phenolic resins, as stabilizing material or antioxidant for numerous types of plastics including polyvinyl chloride [5, 6]. It is also used in polycarbonates, polyacrylates, and corrosion- resistant unsaturated polyester-styrene resins. BPA has been found to be widely distributed in the environment, because of highly production of plastics [7, 8]. BPA is leached from lacquer-coated cans [4], polycarbonate fasks during autoclaving, and baby feeding bottles [9] due to the hydrolysis of the polymer during thermal treatment [4, 10, 11]. Terefore, highly reliable methods are required for the detection of trace amounts of BPA. Some sample preparation techniques such as liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) [12], dispersive liquid-liquid microextraction (DLLME) [13], solid-phase extraction [14– 16], and molecularly imprinted solid-phase extraction [17, 18] have been developed for the extraction of BPA from various matrices. Micelle-mediated extraction is a simple and powerful extraction method that is based on the property of most non- ionic surfactants in the aqueous solutions to form micelles and to separate into a surfactant-rich phase with a small volume. Any component present in the solution that interacts with the micellar aggregates can thus be extracted in the