Analytical and chemical tools for elucidating fate processes controlling exposure to emerging environmental pollutants

化学污染是当今社会一个日益严重的问题。要了解这些化学品可能对人类和生态系统健康造成的风险，我们必须彻底了解它们的环境行为和命运。然而，对于许多目前使用的化学品，如药物及其降解产物，这种认识充其量是有限的，最坏的情况是根本不存在。诸如药物之类的化学物质被设计成具有深远的生物效应，因此日益引起环境方面的关注。目前的测量技术通常依赖于采样，只能说明那个时间点的水平。然而，越来越多的证据表明，这类化学品的释放，例如经过处理的废水的排放，随着时间的推移随着日常和季节性使用模式以及供水（如风暴）和用水的变化而变化。众所周知，许多药物会在人体内代谢和排泄，但对于环境中的这些降解产物，除了怀疑它们可能在浓度上与原始药物相媲美，并且某些形式可能会变回原始化合物外，几乎一无所知。

Chemical pollution is a serious and increasing problem in our society today. To understand the risks such chemicals may pose on human and ecosystem health, we must thoroughly understand their environmental behavior and fate. However, this understanding is at best limited and at worst nonexistent for many current-use chemicals, such as drugs and their degradation products. Chemicals such as drugs are designed to have profound biological effects, and are of increasing environmental concern for that reason. Current measurement techniques typically rely on sampling that only accounts for levels at that point in time. However, there is increasing evidence that release of such chemicals, for example from discharge of treated wastewater, changes over time with daily and seasonal use patterns, and with changes in water supply (such as storms) and water use. While many drugs are well known to be metabolized and excreted in the human body, almost nothing is known about these degradation products in the environment aside from suspicions that they may rival the original drugs in concentrations, and that some forms can turn back into the original compound.