Published:Journal of Chromatographic Science,
ISSN 0021-9665Volume
39, Number 6, June 2001, pp. 239-242
Quantitation
of Ergosterol in River Sediment by Liquid Chromatography
C.
Ravelet*, C. Grosset, and J. Alary
Groupe pour l’Etude du Devenir des Xénobiotiques dans l’Environnement
(GEDEXE), Université J. Fourier, Laboratoire de Chimie Analytique et
Bromatologie, UFR de Pharmacie de Grenoble, Domaine de la Merci, 38706, La Tronche
Cedex, France
The ergosterol content of a river sediment can be used as an
indicator of fungal activity. A method is developed for the extraction and determination
of ergosterol in river sediment as part of a study to assess the correlation
between fungal activity and biodegradation of pyrene, which is an environmental
pollutant. This method is based on saponification and the liquid–liquid
extraction of ergosterol by ethyl acetate. Quantitation and detection are performed
isocratically by liquid chromatography on a 5-µm Hypersil C18 column with
methanol–acetonitrile (80:20, v/v) as the mobile phase and detection at
282 nm. The detection limit is 50 ng/mL ergosterol, which is equivalent to 0.1
µg/g. The recovery of ergosterol at a concentration level in the range
of 2 to 12 µg/mL is 91.7% ± 3.1% without interferences. This method
is applied in order to successfully quantitate the ergosterol content in a river
sediment with or without a fungus supply.
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