Simultaneous Determination and Quantitation of Paraquat, Diquat, Glufosinate and Glyphosate in Postmortem Blood and Urine by LC-MS-MS.

A simple method, incorporating protein-precipitation/organic backwashing and liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS-MS), has been successfully developed for the simultaneous analysis of four highly water-soluble and less volatile herbicides (paraquat, diquat, glufosinate and glyphosate) in ante- and postmortem blood, urine and gastric content samples. Respective isotopically labeled analogs of these analytes were adopted as internal standards. Acetonitrile and dichloromethane were used for protein precipitation and organic solvent backwashing, respectively, followed by injecting the upper aqueous phase into the LC-MS-MS system.