Enantioselective separation and degradation of the herbicide dichlorprop methyl in sediment

Chiral pesticides currently constitute about 50% of all pesticides dosage used in China, and this ratio is increasing as more complex structures are introduced. Dichlorprop methyl (DCPPM) is a chiral herbicide consisting of a pair of enantiomers. In this study, the enantiomeric separation of DCPPM was investigated by gas chromatography (GC) and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) using chiral stationary phases (CSPs), and its enantiomeric degradation was characterized using a DCPPM-degrading bacterial strain isolated from an activated sludge from a textile-printing wastewater treatment plant. Baseline separation by both GC and HPLC was achieved. Incubation with DCPPM-degrading bacteria in different pH solutions showed that the R enantiomer was preferentially degraded over the S enantiomer of DCPPM. The degradation rate constant decreased with increasing pH in the order of k(pH5) approximately k(pH7) >k(pH9). In comparison, the enantioselectivity as indicated by EF followed the order of pH 7 > pH 9-pH 5.