Arsenic speciation in environmental samples of contaminated soil

A coupled method of high performance liquid chromatography and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry was used to determine arsenic compounds, such as arsenite, arsenate, monomethylarsonic acid, dimethylarsinic acid, arsenobetaine and arsenocholine in soils. The technique was successfully applied to analyse environmental samples from an arsenic-contaminated soil; arsenate was found to be the major component. Due to microbial activity, transformation from arsenate to arsenite, resulted in monomethylarsonic acid and dimethylarsinic acid also being present. The measurements showed that the transformations induced by microorganisms in the highly contaminated soil lead to a detoxification. It is thus possible to use microorganisms for phytoremediation of contaminated soils.