Evaluation of Evaporative Sample Preparation Techniques

When introducing any new piece of instrumentation or equipment into a highly controlled environment such as an environmental analysis laboratory, the new unit should be validated to ensure that it has equivalent or better performance to the existing equipment. Any impact on the testing methods can then be fully understood and the testing methods re-validated if necessary. With regard to sample concentration and evaporation technology the most important issue is sample recovery, especially for very volatile analytes. As part of their evaluation of new equipment Laboratoire départemental d’analyses de la Drôme (LDA26) evaluated the new Genevac EZ-2 and compared it to two existing methodologies. A summary of the data is presented in this report.