Characterization of the composition of plant protection products in different formulation types employing suspect screening and unknown approaches

BACKGROUND: Plant protection products (PPPs) are used extensively in agriculture to control crops. These PPPs, which may be found in different types of formulations, are composed of a designated pesticide (active principle) and other inactive ingredients as co‐formulants. They perform specific functions in the formulation, as solvents, preservatives or antifreeze agents, among others. RESULTS: A research technique based on ultra‐high‐performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC) coupled to a Quadrupole‐Orbitrap mass analyzer was successfully applied to characterize the composition of six different PPPs in terms of the presence of co‐formulants and types of formulations: emulsifiable concentrate (EC), emulsion in water (EW), suspension concentrate and water‐dispersible granule. These PPPs (FLINT MAX, MASSOCUR 12.5 EC, IMPACT EVO, TOPAS, LATINO and IMPALA STAR) had antifungal activity, containing one triazole compound as active principle (tebuconazole, penconazole, myclobutanil, flutriafol or fenbuconazole, respectively). Non‐targeted approaches, applying suspect and unknown analysis, were carried out and ten compounds were identified as potential co‐formulants. Six (glyceryl monostearate, 1‐monopalmitin, dimethyl sulfoxide, N,N‐dimethyldecanamide, hexaethylene glycol and 1,2‐benzisothiazol‐3(2H)‐one) were confirmed by injecting analytical standards. Finally, these compounds were quantified in the PPPs. CONCLUSION: The current study allowed for detecting co‐formulants in a wide range of concentrations, between 0.04 (dimethyl sulfoxide) and 19.00 g L(−1) (glyceryl monostearate), highlighting the feasibility of the proposed analytical methodology. Moreover, notable differences among the types of formulations of PPPs were achieved, revealing that EC and EW were the formulations that contained the largest number of co‐formulants (four out of six detected compounds). © 2022 The Authors. Journal of The Science of Food and Agriculture published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Chemical Industry.