Porous monoliths for on-line sample preparation: A review

This review aims at presenting the state of the art concerning monolithic materials for on-line sample preparation emphasizing solid-phase extraction, matrix exchange, and analyte conversion. Emphasis was given to organic and silica-based, as well as hybrid monoliths reported in the literature mostly after 2010. The first part of this review presents materials and strategies for enrichment of inorganic species in environmental and biological samples using mostly ICP-MS detectors. In the second part we focus on organic analytes, discussing the role of surface area of the polymer monoliths and density of adsorption sites for specific interactions, including incorporation of nanoparticles, metal organic frameworks, as well as the preparation of hybrid organic-silica monoliths to increase the surface area. Incorporation of ionic liquids to increase the number of types of interaction mechanisms available for retention is also discussed. Monoliths affording molecular recognition properties achieved by including boronate moieties for cis-diol recognition, as well as antibodies and aptamers for specific molecular recognition are also reviewed. The largest number of applications of molecular recognition mechanisms was observed for molecularly imprinted polymer monoliths as a consequence of the simplicity of this approach when compared to the use of immunosorbents or aptamers. The final part examines the on-line applications of immobilized enzyme reactors used for protein digestion in proteomic analysis and for kinetic studies in drug discovery and clinical assays usually coupling the reactors to mass spectrometers.