WWEM - Abstract

Abstract Information :

The primary role of a drinking water treatment plant is to provide clean drinking water, specifically removing the natural organic matters that come into the soil. Its concentrations in the water can have large fluctuations, changing by orders of magnitude in a day, depending on a rain event, snow melt, or a wastewater discharge. In order to remove it, water treatment plants use chemicals, which however, can react with the organic matter and can cause a variety of harmful products (disinfection byproducts), which are contaminants of concern worldwide.rnrnWe present the power of Absorbance – Transmission Excitation Emission Matrix (A-TEEM) spectroscopy and multivariate analysis to capture an instantaneous reading of this dissolved organic carbon (DOM) concentration, and more importantly, its composition. A-TEEM spectroscopy acquires simultaneously three-dimensional fluorescence spectroscopy data (Excitation Emission Matrix) and the absorbance spectroscopy data, to return a unique signature of the sample independently from its concentration thank to the correction of the so-called inner filter effect (IFE). The IFE is the absorption of the excitation photons and the reabsorption of the emitted photons by the sample itself that will change the shape and intensity of the emission spectrum. The acquisition of fluorescence and absorbance data with the same optical configuration is essential to have a meaningful correction, therefore they are performed with the same instrument, with the employment of a CCD detector to make the acquisition of the fluorescence data extraordinarily fast with the acquisition of the A-TEEM data requiring only a few seconds. Highly sensitive and specific, A-TEEM™ does not require complicated sample preparation and is faster than separation techniques such as GC/MS or LC/MS. Repeatable and reproducible, it allows the creation of molecular libraries and the rapid detection of unknown components.rnrnA-TEEM can track fluorescence fingerprints of natural organic matter in water, also known as the precursors of the disinfection byproducts, to quickly predict, identify and optimize the organics removal, in order to mitigate the occurrence of the disinfection byproducts formation and to ensure compliance with increasingly stringent drinking water quality regulations. rn