SEPARATION OF POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC-HYDROCARBONS ON A WIDE-PORE POLYMERIC C-18 BONDED PHASE

This paper presents a novel wide-pore C-18 bonded phase. This bonded phase has polymeric properties and can separate a broad range of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in different matrices. A column selectivity test mixture containing three well known chosen PAHs was used to evaluate the selectivity (alpha(TBN/BaP) value) of the bonded phase under sub-ambient, ambient and elevated temperatures. The variation of the column selectivity with temperature was studied. The results showed that the separation of critical PAH isomers increased with decreasing temperatures. The separation of the 16 US Environmental Protection Agency PAH priority pollutants was found to vary continuously with temperature and alpha(TBN/BaP) value. The effect of the slope of the gradient was also investigated and it was proved that a steeper gradient increased the separation of dibenz[a,h]anthracene and benz[ghi]perylene. Due to the fact that the column has a relative small internal diameter (3.0 mm), reduction of the mobile phase consumption was found to be almost 50% compared to the standard-size (4.6 mm) HPLC columns.