Biomonitoring of environmental polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon exposure by simultaneous measurement of urinary phenanthrene, pyrene and benzo[a]pyrene hydroxides.

A high-performance liquid chromatographic method with fluorescence detection was developed which enables the simultaneous determination of the urinary polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon metabolites 3-hydroxyphenanthrene, 1-hydroxypyrene and 3-hydroxybenzo[a]pyrene. The method has small solvent consumption because of the use of a microbore RP C18 column and a relatively short run time. Low detection limits of 0.02 nmol/l for 3-hydroxypyrene to 0.19 nmol/l for 3-hydroxybenzo[a]pyrene were attained. In contrast, the detection limits of alpha-naphthol and 9,10-dihydroxy-9,10-dihydrophenanthrene were not adequate for the determination of environmental exposure. The developed method was successfully used for the analysis of urine samples from children.