Stereoselective degradation of ethofumesate in turfgrass and soil

The stereoselective degradation of ethofumesate in turfgrasses and several agricultural soils was investigated to provide details of the fate of this chiral herbicide. Racemic ethofumesate was either foliar applied to two species of turfgrass or fortified into four types of agricultural soils. (+)- and (−)-Enantiomers were extracted and analyzed by a validated chiral HPLC method which involved extraction of samples with organic solvent followed by separation on cellulose-Tris-(3,5-dimethylphenylcarbamate)-based chiral column and quantification by UV absorbance at 230 nm. Mean recoveries of each enantiomer fortified at 0.5, 5, and 10 μg g⁻¹ ranged from 82.3 ± 5.84 to 92.5 ± 2.87% in turfgrasses and from 86.0 ± 5.09 to 98.1 ± 2.51% in soil. As a measure of this composition, the enantiomeric ratio (ER) was used, defined as the concentration ratio of (+)/(−)-enantiomer. Similarly, preferential degradation of the (−)-enantiomer was observed in both grass species with the largest ER of about 3 and in one of the test soil with ER = 1.65, resulting in residues enriched with (+)-enantiomer. This stereoselective degradation in this soil led to significant difference on half-lives between the two enantiomers. No stereoselective degradation was observed in other soils.