Empower your laboratory with LC-MS/MS for wastewater surveillance analysis so you can accurately assess drug consumption and distribution trends in your geography.
Drug surveillance in wastewater
Low level detection of drugs of abuse including NPS in wastewater samples
Wastewater testing has gained popularity over the past two decades as an alternative surveillance tool to study drug consumption trends in many countries. In addition to seizure data and toxicology reports, wastewater analysis provides a cost-efficient methodology to assess a population’s drug consumption and exposure due to the non-invasive sample collection and comprehensive analytical coverage.
Wastewater surveillance of illicit drugs has been a widely used approach to monitor consumption, use, and exposure to drugs of abuse by extracting chemical information from domestic wastewater. This technique provides near real-time information for a specific city or region and gives insight into temporal consumption trends. However, detecting, identifying, and measuring drugs in wastewater remains an analytical challenge due to these substances' low (sub ng/mL) concentration levels in wastewater. Given the complex nature of the matrix and the low quantitation limits required to estimate population consumption, robust and sensitive analytical instrumentation is needed to accurately monitor trace levels of drugs and their metabolites in wastewater.
SCIEX offers a variety of LC-MS/MS instruments, workflows and integrated software solutions to streamline the detection of drugs of abuse, including novel psychoactive substances (NPS), in wastewater. The sensitivity afforded by LC-MS/MS has made this analytical technique the benchmark for routine quantitation of low levels of drugs and metabolites in wastewater due to its speed, selectivity and specificity. Learn how the robustness of our LC-MS/MS instruments enables the analysis of complex wastewater samples with a high degree of precision and accuracy so you can gather wastewater surveillance data to inform public health alerts. Discover how our innovative workflows and integrated software solutions, such as SCIEX OS software, enable customers to reliably screen, identify and quantify drugs of abuse and their metabolites in wastewater so you can actively support local agencies in developing drug education programs and policies to scale down drug use.
Nominal mass resources for drug analysis in wastewater
SCIEX is the industry leader for sensitive molecule quantitation. Learn how the robustness and sensitivity of our nominal mass platforms enable researchers to quantify low levels of drugs and metabolites in complex wastewater samples with a high degree of accuracy and precision.
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Technical note
Quantitation of novel psychoactive substances in wastewater by direct injection analysis
The sensitivity of the SCIEX 7500 system allowed direct injection analysis of low-level NPS present in wastewater while enabling matrix dilution of interferences that would have otherwise been concentrated during SPE and LLE, ultimately improving quantitation accuracy and extending instrument robustness.
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Technical note
Highly sensitive quantification of 12 drugs of abuse in wastewater using a simple dilution approach
The analytical sensitivity of the SCIEX 7500 system allowed for a simple dilution and direct injection approach while still maintaining LOQs of ~1 pg/mL for the 12 drugs of abuse in wastewater.
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Technical note
Targeted quantification and screening of multi-class chemical pollutants (PPCPs, pesticides and drugs) in coastal environments
A multi-residue panel of contaminants including illicit drugs, pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs), pesticides and illicit drugs enabled limits of quantitation (LOQ) as low as 1 ng/L using the SCIEX 7500 system in coastal water samples.
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Technical note
Quantitation and identification of Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products (PPCP) in water samples
A method using fast LC coupled MS/MS using the Scheduled MRM algorithm for the quantitation of 80 PPCP in environmental water samples was successfully developed
Nominal mass LC-MS/MS solutions for wastewater drug testing
SCIEX 7500+ system
The system delivers sensitive and robust quantitation, allowing you to quantify low-level drugs and metabolites in complex wastewater samples with reduced risk of downtime.
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QTRAP system
Explore revolutionary sensitivity, speed, and performance for your most challenging methods. Enable scan functions that can identify, quantify and characterize all at once.
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SCIEX OS software
The all-in-one software that lets you acquire, process and analyze data and even generate reports.
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Accurate mass resources for drug analysis in wastewater
SCIEX has decades of experience pioneering method development for wastewater testing. Learn how accurate mass spectrometry can help you increase the identification of unknown drugs and metabolites with library-matching workflows while improving the mass resolution of endogenous interferences in wastewater samples.
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Technical note
Nontargeted acquisition with targeted and suspect screening of pharmaceutical drugs and their metabolites in wastewater
An end-to-end workflow using the X500R QTOF system was developed to semi-quantitate 105 pharmaceutical drugs in wastewater and identify drug metabolites without a priori knowledge of the analyte details.
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Technical note
Two nontargeted screening approaches for examination of drinking water during treatment
Two workflows based on liquid chromatography coupled to a quadrupole-time-of-flight mass spectrometer (LC-MS) were applied to detect and identify suspect and unknown species in raw and treated water samples collected from drinking water treatment trains.
Accurate mass LC-MS/MS solutions for wastewater drug testing
X500R QTOF system
Benefit from an easy-to-use mass spectrometry system that analyzes data faster through the power of data-independent acquisition with SWATH DIA.
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SCIEX OS software
The all-in-one software that lets you acquire, process and analyze data and even generate reports.
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Forensic HR-MS/MS spectral library 2.1
Confirm identification of commonly tested drugs and metabolites using the Forensic HR-MS/MS spectral library.
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More forensic-related content
Forensic toxicology
Whether you need to comprehensively screen for drugs, confirm and quantify them, identify unknown substances or characterize new and emerging drugs, SCIEX has a solution that meets all your most demanding requirements.
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Doping control
Unveil the truth hidden in doping samples by leveraging SCIEX solutions to confidently detect, identify and quantify trace levels of prohibited substances in biological specimens. Our robust suite of instruments provides the sensitivity, specificity and selectivity required to deliver confident results and keep competition fair.
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Homeland security
Detecting trace levels of seized drugs, chemical warfare agents, explosives or illicit materials requires high throughput and sensitive instrumentation. SCIEX has an extensive portfolio of LC-MS/MS instrumentation that provides the evidence required by the forensic and security communities.
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Cannabinoid analysis and potency testing
The diversity of cannabinoids makes it hard to perform analysis and potency testing accurately. SCIEX provides sensitive, precise instrumentation capable of differentiating synthetic and natural cannabinoids. Forensic labs, where such use is permitted under local state or country law, can now test with the highest confidence.
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