RESOLUTION OF A MULTICOMPONENT POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC HYDROCARBON SYSTEMIN MICELLAR MEDIA BY LINEAR VARIABLE-ANGLE FLUORESCENCE APPLYING DISTINCT CHEMOMETRIC TECHNIQUES

The simultaneous spectrofluorimetric determination of aromatic polycyc lic hydrocarbons of environmental interest, namely benzo[a]pyrene. ben zo[e]pyrene, benzo[ghi]perylene, coronene, dibenzo[a,h]anthracene and indeno[1,2,3-cd]pyrene, in micellar media by using the non-ionic surfa ctant polyoxyethylene 10 lauryl ether (POLE) was investigated. In orde r to employ the highest sensitivity signals for the determination of e ach of the compounds in the mixture, the corresponding linear variable angle fluorescence spectra were recorded. Owing to the high spectral overlap observed, resolution of the multicomponent system was carried out by applying known algorithms such as multiple linear regression, p artial least squares regression type 1 and artificial neural networks. The results obtained for both synthetic mixtures and water samples of two different origins spiked with known amounts of hydrocarbons of in terest were satisfactory.