Determination of Petroleum Aromatic Hydrocarbons in Seawater Using Headspace Solid-Phase Microextraction Coupled to Gas Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

The headspace solid-phase microextraction (HS-SPME) followed by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry procedure has been developed for the simultaneous determination of petroleum aromatic hydrocarbons such as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene isomers (BTEX) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in seawater. The advantages of SPME compared to traditional methods of sample preparation are ease of operation, re-use of fiber, portable system, minimal contamination and loss of the sample during transport and storage. SPME fiber, extraction time, temperature, stirring speed, and GC desorption time were key extraction parameters considered in this study. When applied to artificially contaminated seawater like water accommodated fraction, our optimized HS-SPME-GC/MS showed comparable performances with other conventional methods. The proposed protocol can be an attractive alternative to analysis of BTEX and PAHs in seawater after oil spill.