Large volume cold on column injection into a capillary gas chromatography-mass specgrometer system is a technique which has been applied to both increasing productivity and in enhancing sensitivity by injecting hundreds of microliters of sample as opposed to being limited to typically 1-3µl.

In the analysis of target pesticides and herbicides in drinking water one of the key issues in productivity relates to the initial requirement for a large sample volume as a consequence of a detection limit of 10ppt. Inevitably working with such a large sample volume constrains the sample preparation turnover whether the target analytes are extracted by liquid-liquid or by solid phase. Despite developments in automating the sample preparation protocols a significant source of analytical error still resides in sample pre-concentration. One approach which has been used to reduce errors in sample preparation and improve productivity is large volume injection (LVI) GC-MS. In this application LVI-GC-MS was used in validating sample preparation protocols for the analysis of organophosphorus, organochlorine pesticides and triazine herbicides using millilitres of sample as opposed to litres using both positive electron impact ionisation and negative chemical ionisation modes of detection.