Simultaneous separation and determination of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons by high-performance liquid chromatography in the manufacture of anthraquinone from anthracene cake

Abstract

A simple, isocratic and rapid reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatographic method for the separation and simultaneous determination of carbazole, fluorene, phenanthrene, anthracene, fluoranthene, pyrene and 2-methylanthracene from anthracene cake is proposed. The method is also suitable for the separation and simultaneous determination of 9-fluorenone, phenanthrenequinone, carbazole, anthrone, fluorene, phenanthrene and anthracene from industrial anthraquinone of high purity. Reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography was carried out on a 10-µm C₁₈ Spherisorb ODS 2 column, using methanol-water (82 + 18 V/V) as the eluent, at a flow-rate of 1.5 ml min^–1 with UV detection at 254 nm. The analysis of industrial samples of both anthracene cake and anthraquinone required no longer than 12 and 8 min, respectively. The coefficients of variation were in the ranges 1.03–2.97 and 1.67–3.11%, respectively. The proposed method is simple, reproducible and rapid. It is suitable for the determination of the impurities present in the manufacture of high-purity anthraquinone from anthracene cake.