Bioremediation of toluene and naphthalene: development and validation of a GC-FID method for their monitoring

Bioremediation of toluene and naphthalene in liquid cultures of bacteria grown in the presence of these aromatic compounds as unique sources of carbon was investigated by gas chromatography (GC). For this purpose, a method based on the use of GC with flame ionization detection was developed and validated. Validation was carried out in terms of limit of detection (LOD), limit of quantitation (LOQ), linearity, precision and trueness. In the case of naphthalene, LOD and LOQ values of 0.43 and 0.72 mg kg-1 were achieved. Linearity was established over one order of magnitude in the range of interest, i.e. 10-100 mg kg-1. Excellent precision was obtained both in terms of intra-day repeatability and between-day precision on two concentration levels (RSD% lower than 0.5%). A recovery of 97.9 ± 0.2% (n=3) was calculated by addition of 640 mg kg-1 of naphthalene to the Bushnell & Haas mineral salts basal solution containing the micro-organisms. Findings clearly showed a reduction of the naphthalene content equal to 50% and 75% after two and four weeks of contact with the micro-organisms, whereas a lower degradation was shown in the case of toluene. Finally bioremediation activity was ascribed to two different microbial populations, Bordetella Petrii and Bacillus Sphericus, which survived in the polluted medium.