DETERMINATION OF POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC HYDROCARBON IN DRY MEAT POPULARLY KNOWN AS TIKO IN WARRI AND ITS ENVIRONMENT

Smoking and/or grilling, when carried out with traditional methods involving direct contact with wood combustion fumes, is responsible for high contamination levels with carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). The aim of this work was to investigate the PAH content of different smoked or grilled meat and fish products, commonly consumed in Nigeria. A rapid method involving microwave assisted saponification and simultaneous extraction followed by solid phase extraction (SPE), HPLC separation and spectrofluorometric detection was employed. Samples which were smoked or grilled using traditional systems, which use a wood fire, were heavily contaminated with benzo[a]pyrene (BaP) at levels ranging from 2.4 to 31.2 µg kg-1 wet weight.