Recoverable σ_PAH/σ_đust ratio and lost fraction of PAHs after one cycle of clustering for different PAH species and different initial σ_PAH using the standard dust model. The dotted black line assumes a standard ISM abundance of PAHs. For PAH abundances higher than σ_PAH/σ_dust ≥ 30 (≈ 0.1 × ISM) the maximum abundance is reached (Sect. 3.1) and information on the initial PAH abundance is lost. For σ_PAH/σ_dust < 1, almost all PAHs can be recovered because adsorption is much faster than coagulation and processing has no effect on the PAH abundance any longer as all PAHs are preserved.