The Rapid Screening of Body Tissues for Pentachlorophenol (PGP) with Special Reference to a Poisoning Fatality

✍ Scribed by H.M. Stevens; A. Richardson

• Publisher: Elsevier
• Year: 1979
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 437 KB
• Volume: 19
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0015-7368
• DOI: 10.1016/s0015-7368(79)71262-x

✦ Synopsis

Pentachlorophenol (PCP) was extracted with n-heptane or diethyl ether from samples of blood and liver homogenate after addition to these samples. T ~P extracted compound was assayed by UVspectrophotometry either directly by back-extraction into alkali from n-heptane or by T L C clean up of the diethyl ether extract (from subtilisin deproteinated liver samples) and extraction of the PCP from the plate material with alkali. The orange coloured compound formed by the action oJfurnincq nitric acid on PCP was ident$ed as tetrachloroortho-benzoquinone by mass spectrometry, and the colour reaction obeyed Beer's Law over a PCP concentration range of 14pg to 70yglml in sulphuric acid at 480nm. The orange colour changed to blue with alkali enabling a conjrrnatory test to be carried out on PCP extracted from tissue samples. These extraction and assay techniques were applied successfully to blood samples, which were taken from a fatal case of PCP ingestion, and which were found to contain a mean level of 46pglml.