Identification of major water-soluble fluorescent components of some petrochemicals.

The chemical identities of several organic compounds that dominate the ultraviolet (UV) fluorescence of water after exposure to gasoline, diesel fuel and crude oil are presented. A combination of high-performance liquid chromatography with UV-fluorescence detection, fluorescence spectroscopy and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) is used to show that naphthalene, methylnaphthalene and methylstyrene are the major fluorescent species in water following exposure to gasoline. These compounds are not dominant in water exposed to other petrochemicals we studied.