Nowadays we all know the health risks posed by asbestos, and the great lengths taken to detect it and eliminate it from our environment. At one point, however, asbestos was used in everything from insulation material and flooring material to the brake linings used in cars, meaning there is plenty of it still out there.
Current methods of asbestos analysis are geared towards looking at building materials, but are not sensitive enough to detect the substance in soil. But recent work by a team of US scientists could solve this problem, boosting the sensitivity of the technique 100-fold.
To read the full article please visit Chemistry World.
Evaluation of a fluidized bed asbestos segregator preparation method for the analysis of low-levels of asbestos in soil and other solid media
J. Januch, W. Brattin, L. Woodbury and D. Berry
Anal. Methods, 2013, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C3AY26254E
