Method Development and Validation to Identify Plastic Additives in Snails and Biofilm using LC-MS.
Supervisor: Eric Carmona Martinez (UFZ)
The growing concern over plastic pollution has highlighted the need for effective methods to detect and quantify plastic additives in freshwater ecosystems. This study addresses the gap by developing and validating advanced analytical techniques for identifying plastic additives in snails and biofilm samples. Snails, due to their limited mobility and sensitivity to contaminants, and biofilms, given their complex biological composition, are excellent bioindicators for assessing environmental pollution. However, the biological complexity of these matrices presents significant analytical challenges. This research utilized Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS) for the analysis of 83 plastic additives. Two extraction methods were evaluated for their efficiency in isolating these additives from snail and biofilm matrices. The results indicated that the recovery rates of the additives varied significantly depending on the method used and the concentration of the chemicals, highlighting the importance of matrix effects and the need for method optimization. These findings contribute valuable data for environmental monitoring and offer insights into the interactions between plastic additives and freshwater organisms. This study not only advances the analytical methodologies for complex environmental samples but also provides critical information to inform regulatory policies and mitigation strategies for plastic pollution in freshwater ecosystems.