Evaluation of analytical method and risk assessment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons for fishery products in Korea

This study quantified eight polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in fishery products. Satisfactory linearity (r > 0.99), recovery (80.00–120.00%), LOD (0.21–0.54 μg/kg), LOQ (0.07–0.18 μg/kg), accuracy (81.00–120.00%), and precision (0.61–15.00%) of 8 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) were obtained. The average concentration of PAH8 was 2.13 μg/kg. PAHs concentrations were converted to carcinogenicity of benzo [a]pyrene (BaP) to recalculate the toxic equivalent value (TEQ) of individual PAHs and then divided by age group to evaluate the average exposure to PAHs for the whole population and determine the 95th percentile of exposure from daily intake of fishery products. The exposure amount of PAH8 was 7.18 × 10⁻⁴μg-TEQ_BaP/kg/day. Based on estimated total dietary exposure to PAHs published by WHO/JECFA, the margin of exposure (MOE) of PAH8 was 6.54 × 10¹⁰, demonstrating that intake associated with fishery products is negligible. Based on MOE, incremental lifetime cancer risk of total PAHs showed low level of potential risk.