Comparison of air-agitated liquid-liquid microextraction and ultrasound-assisted emulsification microextraction for polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons determination in hookah water

In this work, two disperser‐free microextraction methods, namely, air‐agitated liquid–liquid microextraction and ultrasound‐assisted emulsification microextraction are compared for the determination of a number of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in aqueous samples, followed by gas chromatography with flame ionization detection. The effects of various experimental parameters upon the extraction efficiencies of both methods are investigated. Under the optimal conditions, the enrichment factors and limits of detection were found to be in the ranges of 327–773 and 0.015–0.05 ng/mL for air‐agitated liquid–liquid microextraction and 406–670 and 0.015–0.05 ng/mL for ultrasound‐assisted emulsification microextraction, respectively. The linear dynamic ranges and extraction recoveries were obtained to be in the range of 0.05–120 ng/mL (R2 ≥ 0.995) and 33–77% for air‐agitated liquid–liquid microextraction and 0.05–110 ng/mL (R2 ≥ 0.994) and 41–67% for ultrasound‐assisted emulsification microextraction, respectively. To investigate this common view among some people that smoking hookah is healthy due to the passage of smoke through the hookah water, samples of both the hookah water and hookah smoke were analyzed.