Determination Method for Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons in Ambient PM_2.5

Objective To establish a convenient and efficient method to detect 16 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in PM_2.5.

Methods PAHs were extracted from samples via acetonitrile-ultrasonic water bath, purified by ENV solid-phase extraction column, separated by polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon special chromatographic column, and then detected by liquid chromatography-fluorescence ultraviolet detector in combination.

Results Sixteen kinds of PAHs had a good linear relationship within their respective linear range, and the correlation coefficients were all higher than 0.999 9. The range of limit of detection is (0.04~0.26) ng/m³, the average recovery rate is 85%~114.1%, and the relative standard deviations are all less than 8.0%.

Conclusions This method has simple extraction process, high sensitivity, and high precision, and is suitable for the pollution analysis of PAHs in PM_2.5.