Simple luminescence method for estimation of benzo[a]pyrene in a complex mixture of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons without a pre‐separation procedure

Abstract

Benzo[a]pyrene causes cancer at cellular level and is widely present in the environment. Conventional spectroscopic methods for analysis of this compound need a pre‐separation procedure due to severe spectral overlap from other polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. We report a simple method that avoids spectral overlap of benzo[a]pyrene from other impurities or polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), thus it can easily identify benzo[a]pyrene in a complex PAH mixture. The method could easily identify benzo[a]pyrene in an 18‐component PAH mixture. Calibration plots in methanol solution and in micellar media show a good linearity (R > 0.9997) in the benzo[a]pyrene concentration range generally found in the environment. The method gives a detection limit of 1.52 × 10⁻⁹ mol/L in CTAB micellar medium and 2.55 × 10⁻⁹ mol/L in methanol solution. The proposed method is selective, sensitive and fast. The fluorescence response of benzo[a]pyrene is found to be a potential candidate to sense the critical micellar concentration (CMC) of CTAB micelles. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.