[Supramolecular solvent-based direct extraction for the determination of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in water]

Supramolecular solvent (SUPRAS) is a nano-structured liquid generated from amphiphiles through a sequential self-assembly process. It is an efficient and excellent solvent for the sample extraction. In this paper, a method to directly extract and rapidly analyze polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in water samples by high performance liquid chromatography-fluorescence detection (HPLC-FLD) was developed. The composition and amount of SUPRAS were optimized and practical samples were tested. It indicated that the combination of tetrahydrofuran and 1-octanol was a suitable SUPRAS for the extraction of four PAHs with recoveries between 89.08% and 102.47% and relative standard deviations (RSDs) from 1.38% to 3.92% (n=5). Results showed a good linearity of four PAHs with the correlation coefficients (R²) more than 0.999. The limits of detection (LODs) ranged from 1.26 to 9.23 ng/L. The proposed pretreatment method greatly reduces the analysis time. And the solvent-less approach is in accordance with the development trend of green chemistry and of great application prospects.