Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in medicinal plants from Syria

Abstract

The levels of 16 US Environmental Protection Agency polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (EPA PAHs) in 10 medicinal plants in different used parts of plant (leaves and flowers) have been determined. The analytical method consists of sample preparation by ultrasonic extraction with dichloromethane followed by silica gel clean-up. Subsequently, the analysis was carried out by reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled to both ultraviolet and fluorescence detections in series to insure the detection of all 16 EPA PAHs. It was observed that the sum of the 16 PAHs (ΣPAHs) in the investigated medicinal plants ranged from 47 to 890 μg kg^–1 where the highest ΣPAHs was found in Sage plant sample. Light PAHs were dominants in all studied medicinal plants. The sum of eight genotoxic PAHs (ΣPAH8) have shown a better indicator of the degree of contamination with carcinogenic PAHs compared to benzo[a]pyrene in these products.

Keywords:

• polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons
• benzo[a]pyrene
• medicinal plants
• HPLC

Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge Prof. I. Othman, Director General of AECS, for his invaluable assistance during the progress of this work. Thanks are also due to the head of the chemistry department, Prof. T. Yassin, for his continuous support.