Determination of Aromatic Hydrocarbons in the Gill Extract of Five... 3 Determination of Aromatic Hydrocarbons in the Gill Extract of Five Different Fish Species Along the

ABSTRACT. The contamination of fishes by Polycyclic Aromatic Hy-drocarbons (PAH) is posing a great threat to public health and marine life, wherever there is oil pollution. Five different species of fishes were studied from Gizan and two species from Jeddah area. The ex-tract of gills of these fishes were examined for the content of eleven different hydrocarbons. They were estimated by HPLC and quantifi-cation was achieved by individual standard hydrocarbons. It was ob-served that gills extract contained all the aromatic hydrocarbons. In the fishes from Jeddah region the range of these hydrocarbons was found to be from 0.001 ppm (for biphenyl) to 1.7 ppm (for o-xylene). While in the fishes from Gizan this range was 0.001 ppm (for biphenyl) upto 2.0 ppm for p- and m-xylene. All these fishes were found to be contaminated and it is urgently needed to control the source of con-tamination