Detect 'forever chemicals' in under 3 minutes

New lab-based method to detect traces of PFAS from food packaging material, water and soil samples

12-Feb-2024 - PFAS have earned the name “forever chemicals” with good reason — the man-made compounds, which can take thousands of years to degrade and are found in everything from grease-resistant food packaging to water-repellent clothing, have made their way into nearlyhalf the U.S. tap water supply. Now, ...

Let it glow: Scientists develop new approach to detect ‘forever chemicals’ in water

18-Jan-2024 - Scientists at the University of Birmingham in collaboration with scientists from the Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung (BAM) have developed a new approach for detecting pollution from ‘forever chemicals’ in water through luminescence. PFAS or ‘forever chemicals’ are manufactured ...

Bottled water can contain hundreds of thousands of previously uncounted tiny plastic bits

A new microscopic technique zeroes in on the poorly explored world of nanoplastics, which can pass into blood, cells and your brain

11-Jan-2024 - In recent years, there has been rising concern that tiny particles known as microplastics are showing up basically everywhere on Earth, from polar ice to soil, drinking water and food. Formed when plastics break down into progressively smaller bits, these particles are being consumed by humans ...

Tracking down Environmental Toxins

Detection of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) by interrupted energy transfer

02-Nov-2023 - PFAS, a family of highly fluorinated substances, represent a danger for humans and the environment. Particularly problematic members of this family, such as perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) appear to cause organ damage and cancer, as well as disrupting the ...

A mobile breakthrough for water environment monitoring

A novel colorimetric multi-channel sensor on cell phone platform

26-Jan-2023 - Reliable colorimetric analysis technologies have been widely praised for their highly sensitive and selective responses towards various contaminants in environmental monitoring. In principle, the chromogenic agent selectively reacts with the target in water samples, and the colored product ...

Wastewater provides new insight into Covid-19 dynamics

An interdisciplinary team shows that the R number of coronavirus can be estimated quickly and cost-effectively from wastewater

17-Dec-2021 - Since the start of the coronavirus (Sars-Cov-2) pandemic, many public health measures have been decided based on its dynamic of spread, more precisely, on the reproductive number of the virus, known as the R number. This value indicates how many people on average are infected by a person carrying ...

Microlab on a chip: Water please, but clean

A further developed chip prototype for water analysis devices

11-Nov-2021 - A microfluidic chip takes up a water sample, adds the necessary chemicals and transports it to the detection site. What's the point? In this way, the water is to be analyzed fully automatically and with various parameters, and at the lowest possible cost. A further developed chip prototype for ...

Consumer protection: Novel method for detecting hormonally active substances

Analytical method for risk assessment of products and food

11-Oct-2021 - Scientists from the Universities of Dresden and Leipzig have presented a new method for detecting hormonally active substances in food, cosmetics and water in the journal “Biosensors & Bioelectronics”. Hormonally active substances can cause serious health problems, including breast and prostate ...

Detection of viruses, bacteria and toxins in real time

IHP scientists win Leibniz Founding Award 2021

08-Apr-2021 - For their start-up project HyPhoX, the scientists Dr. Patrick Steglich and Prof. Dr. Andreas Mai from the Leibniz Institute for High Performance Microelectronics, IHP, in Frankfurt Oder received the Leibniz Founding Award 2021. The award-winning project provides a universal analysis tool for ...

Tracking down polluters

04-Sep-2019 - Proving criminal machinations can be difficult – for instance when those involved covertly discharge hazardous wastewater into sewers. A new sensor system developed by Fraunhofer researchers and their partners could soon help safety agencies establish wrongdoing: placed in a sewage canal, it ...