Spectroscopy E-Books
Effluents from wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are a major source of contamination by pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) in the environment. The presence of low levels of PPCPs in surface and drinking water sources raises public concern because of the potential detrimental ecological effects of these contaminants. Because of these concerns, scientists and engineers have been interested in detecting PPCPs in water to evaluate their fate and transport in the environment, as well as monitor their transformation and degradation at WWTPs. Liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (LC–MS) has been the method of choice for separation and detection of PPCPs, because PPCPs are highly soluble in water and have low volatility. The majority of LC–MS methods use electrospray ionization either in positive or negative mode, with an acidic or basic mobile phase, respectively. As an alternative, this article presents the use of “wrong-way-round ionization” in electrospray mass spectrometry, where protonation of neutral or weakly basic molecules occurs in a strongly basic mobile phase in LC–MS. When “wrong-way-round ionization” was employed in LC–MS for the analysis of PPCPs in wastewater samples, increased signal intensities, by at least an order of magnitude, were observed in PPCPs with diverse polarity and acidic properties.
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Best of the Week: What You Missed from Pittcon and AAFS
March 14th 2025Top articles published this week include a video interview on the role of near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy in food and bioanalysis, a recap of an important session at Pittcon, and a dynamic video that summarizes the highlights of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences (AAFS) Conference.
New Fluorescence Model Enhances Aflatoxin Detection in Vegetable Oils
March 12th 2025A research team from Nanjing University of Finance and Economics has developed a new analytical model using fluorescence spectroscopy and neural networks to improve the detection of aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) in vegetable oils. The model effectively restores AFB1’s intrinsic fluorescence by accounting for absorption and scattering interferences from oil matrices, enhancing the accuracy and efficiency for food safety testing.