A sensitive GC/MS method using cold fiber SPME to determine polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in spring water

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) are carcinogenic to humans and can be found in various environments. This paper describes a cold fiber (CF) solid-phase microextraction (SPME) sampling method with gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC/MS) to identify 16 PAH in spring water. The method yields good results for some validation parameters. The LOD and LOQ ranged from 7.10 to 57.96 ng L− 1 and from 23.60 to 193.19 ng L− 1, respectively. The intra-assay precision shows a coefficient of variation (CV) ranging from 4.38 to 17.65%, and recovery tests varied from 76 ± 13% to 99 ± 8%. The proposed method was attractive, as it extracted higher amounts of PAH in a single extraction procedure in comparison with conventional approaches. The method was applied to the analyses of PAH in twenty-four spring water samples collected in Divinópolis City, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Average PAH concentrations were in the range of 62.80 ± 10.40 ng L− 1 for Benzo[a]anthracene and 146.58 ± 98.98 ng L− 1 for Benzo[a]pyrene.