"The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them"

Sir William Bragg

to the research group "Inorganic Trace Analysis" located within the Institute of Chemical Technologies and Analytics. On our newly designed web-page you may now obtain information regarding our research, file through some of our publications and learn more about our co-workers (and how to co-work).

In the research group Inorganic Trace Analysis, focus is laid on the following topics :

•  Elemental analysis

Determination of inorganic major, minor and trace components in environmental, medical or technological samples.

• Sample preparation / automation

Development of new and advanced solid phase extraction (SPE) procedures (e.g., dispersed particle extraction) for analyte enrichment or matrix separation as well as improvements and automation of existing methods (e.g. flow injection analysis-FIA) including on-line coupling to our detection techniques.

• Direct solid analysis

Qualitative and quantitative analysis of solid or powder samples (e.g., plant, fly ash, ...) by electrothermal vaporisation (ETV) or laser ablation (LA) without prior digestion.

• Distribution analysis

Spatially resolved investigations by LA-ICP-MS / LA-ICP-OES to determine the distribution of major and minor components in compact samples.

• Bio-availability of trace metals

From a toxicological point of view, not only the total elemental content of (heavy-)metals but also their bio-availability is of great interest. To accurately determine the bio-available part of trace metals, the development of appropriate procedures is required.