In this study, a rapid and inexpensive method called coated vial solidphase microextraction for determining the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in aqueous samples was presented. In this method for the first time consists of a commercial 10mL serum vial (penicillin flask) coated with mercaptopropyl moiety a thin layer of adsorbent immobilized on the inner surface of the vial. Extraction was started by adding 5mL of the sample into the vial and shaking by hand. Then the washing and elution process was performed. To analysis the target compounds, high-performance liquid chromatography were used. The peaks are evaluated either by their area or height. In this study, the condition of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons extractions was optimized by varying the handshaking time, salt concentration, elution time, sample pH, type of elution solvent, and volume of elution solvent. The repeatabilities for one device, expressed as relative standard deviation, were 3.9%–5.8%. The limit of detections for the studied compounds were 0.01–0.03 mg L1. Linear dynamic range of 0.0001–10mg L1 with good determination coefficients (R2) were in the range of 0.995–0.998 for polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Extraction recoveries for different real samples were 97.3%–104.1%. Finally, the proposed method was applied for the analysis of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in aqueous samples.
