A novel capillary microliter droplet sample injection–chemiluminescence detector and its application to the determination of benzoyl peroxide in wheat flour

A novel capillary microliter order droplet injection–chemiluminescence (CL) system is proposed. In this system, the liquid sample microdrops, automatically formed at the end of a capillary tip by the effect of the gravity and the gas pressure, repeatedly drop into the miniature reaction cell and reacts with CL reagent to generate CL signal. The phenomena of sample zone dilution and spreading are eliminated as the capillary is used as the sample channel and gas pressure is used as driving force without the liquid carrier stream. Therefore, a high sensitivity is obtained. To evaluate the applicability of the proposed method, a determination of benzoyl peroxide (BP) is examined. The system shows that the benzoyl peroxide is detected linearly in the concentration range from 5×10−10 to 1×10−6 g ml−1. The detection limit (signal-to-noise ratio=3) is 1.4×10−10 g ml−1 for benzoyl peroxide (mass concentration is 1.1 pg, i.e., 4.5 fmol), which is the best result reported so far. The relative standard deviation (n=11) is 1.5% for 2.0×10−8 g ml−1 BP. The proposed detector for the detection of benzoyl peroxide offers the advantages of sensitivity, simplicity, rapidity, automation and miniaturization. The proposed method has been applied satisfactorily to the determination of benzoyl peroxide in wheat flour.