Rapid separation of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons by packed column supercritical fluid chromatography

The separation in 6 minutes of the sixteen US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) on a single packed column by supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC) is described and compared to that obtained using liquid chromatography with the same column. Several environmental samples containing polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons obtained from various sources including soil, water, petrochemicals and coal have been analysed by SFC under optimised conditions. Packed column SFC is shown to be an efficient and promising method for the rapid monitoring of environmental polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.