Field analytical methods

Actually, special attention is paid in the application of biosensors in environmental analysis. The high cost and slow turnaround times typically associated with the measurement of regulated pollutants clearly indicates a need for environmental screening and monitoring methods that are fast, portable and cost-effective. To meet this need, a variety of field analytical methods have been introduced. Because of their unique characteristics, however, technologies such as DNA sensors and immunosensors based on AuNPs might be exploited to fill specific niche applications in the environmental monitoring area. 

Detergents for household and industrial use consist of a large number of very different individual components. As a result of the technical development as well as ecological and economical restrictions, these products are continuously changing. Thus, it is not surprising that in this field analytical methods are constantly under further development and that product-related analytical methods come of age fairly rapidly. 

Over the past years, immunoassay field test kits have become a prominent field analytical method for environmental analysis. Below is a brief outline of the method (Figure 17.4). 

Table 3. Some activities of the US EPA in field analytical methods number of sites by technology (EPA 542-R-97-0I I. November 1997) ...

With the passage of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act in 1976 and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (i.e., Superfund) in 1980, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) entered a new era in regulation. Due to these key environmental legislation acts, the EPA s list of hazardous compounds expanded, which placed additional burdens on the EPA s Contract Laboratory Program. Turnaround time from the contract laboratories was typically greater than 30 days [108] and this was not acceptable for the many critical and timely decisions that had to be made for the remediation of contaminated sites. Consequently, field-analytical methods were developed to supplement laboratory-analytical methods. 

FAM field analytical method lAES ion-excited Auger electron spectroscopy... 

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