Environmental compartments aqueous samples

Since the beginning of the 1980s, the presence of surfactants in solid matrices has slowly received more attention. The publication by Giger and coworkers in 1984 [2] on the anaerobic formation in sewage sludge of nonylphenol (NP) out of alkylphenol ethoxylates (APEOs) particularly stressed the importance of this environmental compartment. However, environmental data of surfactants in sediments and sludges remains scarcer than data on aqueous concentrations, undoubtedly because sediment samples are more difficult to handle. 

Despite the ubiquity of phthalate contamination of environmental samples, there is a general lack of data for concentrations in the various environmental compartments. Concentrations are usually quoted for DEHP, which can reach 300 ngm-3 in air, tens of ppm dry wt in sediments, but are usually low in water (up to 2.5 (tgl-1). DEHP has a low vapour pressure and aqueous... 

Correct sampling and storage of environmental samples are indispensable in environmental analysis. On the one hand, the samples must be representative of the environmental compartment from which they were taken and, on the other hand, it must be guaranteed that the chemical composition of the samples does not change during storage. The main problem in the analysis of surfactants is that they tend to concentrate at all interfaces due to their amphiphilic nature. Consequently, losses from aqueous solutions occur because of adsorption of the surfactants to... 

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