Herbicide residues in crop, soil and contamination of groundwater have
become a worldwide concern in recent decades as their presence at low concentrations
entails an unacceptable risk to human health and non-target organism. The magnitude
of exposure and concentration at a particular time may trigger bioaccumulation and bio
magnifications of herbicide residues and their degraded products, causing mutagenic,
carcinogenic and teratogenic effects on humans, flora and fauna and microbiological
living system. These atrocious circumstances have raised concern about their presence
in environmental compartments and necessitate the continuous monitoring of herbicide
residues in various matrices. However, determining the herbicide residues in the soil
and crop is challenging because of the very low concentration of analyte, complicated
sample matrices and low maximum residue limit (MRL) imposed by the regulatory
agencies. The detection limits imposed by environment quality legislation can only be
achieved by using appropriate sample preparation techniques, which comprise isolation
and concentration of the analytes with nominal matrix interference, thus allowing its
facile detection and quantification through instrumental analysis. In recent years, the
requirements for separation and pre-concentration procedures have undergone
numerous changes, and various sample preparation methods have been used. The final
step in the analytical process involves the identification and quantification of the
herbicide residues using suitable instrumentation, and over the years, herbicides have
been determined by spectrophotometric, chromatographic, electrochemical,
electrophoretic, hyphenated and biosensors. This book chapter provides a
comprehensive overview of the novelties and the advantages of different techniques
employed for the detection of herbicides and their transformation products in
environmental samples.
Keywords: Biosensors, Chromatographic Methods, Electrochemical, Herbicides, Hyphenated, Maximum Residue Limit, Microextraction, Pretreatment, Quantification, Transformation Products
