Over the past decade, wastewater-based epidemiology has emerged as an effective tool to estimate community illicit drug consumption. Concentrations of drug metabolites are quantified in raw wastewater, converted to daily mass loads, and estimated on a per capita basis. However, an estimation of the size of the daily population which contributes to the sample remains as one of the largest uncertainties of this technique.  Populations are dynamic and thus static population estimates derived from census data may not accurately reflect actual daily population.  Ideally, population would be quantified with each daily composite sample.  This paper reports on the concentrations and daily loads of multiple potential, sewer available, population biomarkers (ibuprofen, acesulfame, hydrochlorothiazide, sucralose, gabapentin, and caffeine).  These compounds were quantified from a week of daily influent wastewater samples from seven treatment plants in Washington State.  These plants service regions from 33,000 to nearly 900,000 people across the state.  Each compound will be compared to literature values for these compounds in wastewater in other countries as well as among each plant by determining correlations with census derived population estimates.

Investigation of commonly consumed compounds as potential population biomarkers for wastewater-based epidemiology

Macromolecular Chemistry: The Second Century

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ACS Spring 2020 National Meeting & Expo

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.