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Seeing the invisible threats in drinking water

Thermo Fisher Scientific’s new generation of mass spectrometry technology is helping scientists detect and address “forever chemicals”

By Terri Somers
Senior Manager, Global PR and StoryLab

A SINGLE drop of water in an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

That is the scale at which some of today’s most consequential environmental discoveries are being made - concentrations so minuscule they once escaped reliable detection altogether.

In North Carolina, those discoveries include identifying man-made chemicals in drinking water at concentrations so low they were at the limit of what earlier instruments could reliably measure, even though health experts warned that trace amounts could pose risks.

The ability to now see more clearly and accurately measure molecular components in drinking water and other substances is driven by a new generation of analytical technologies, including the Thermo Scientific™ Orbitrap™ Astral™ Mass Spectrometer (MS) from Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Lee Ferguson’s lab at Duke University serves as the North Carolina PFAS Research Network’s main high-resolution mass spectrometry hub. Credit: Duke University

Mass spectrometry allows researchers to identify and measure the mass of the molecules in a sample with extreme precision, whether it is water, food or a biological substance. It has been a workhorse of science for decades. The Orbitrap Astral MS has been designed to increase measurement sensitivity, throughput, and quantitative accuracy, enabling researchers to make better-informed decisions from complex samples, faster and at greater scale.

“The Orbitrap Astral is an enabling technology,” said Lee Ferguson, Ph.D., an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Duke University. “It really changed the way we do the work.”

North Carolina’s PFAS reckoning

North Carolina began to suspect it had a serious drinking water contamination problem in 2016, when chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), or “forever chemicals”, were found in public water sources derived from the Cape Fear River. More than 350,000 North Carolina homes rely on drinking water from the river.

PFAS, which have been around since the 1950s, can be found in everyday products, from nonstick cookware and stain-resistant fabrics to cosmetics and firefighting foam. These chemicals do not naturally break down in the environment, hence the nickname. Instead, they accumulate in the environment, entering water reservoirs, crops, livestock, and, eventually, the human population. Some PFAS have been linked to increased health risks.

Detecting them in drinking water is notoriously difficult.

“We’re talking about vanishingly small amounts,” Lee said. “It’s the equivalent of a single drop of water in an Olympic-sized swimming pool.”

North Carolina’s Haw River, where the PFAS Research Network identified a source of PFAS. Credit: Duke University

The Orbitrap Astral is an enabling technology, it really changed the way we do the work.”

Lee Ferguson, Ph.D.

Associate professor of civil and environmental engineering

Duke University

That challenge gave rise to the North Carolina PFAS Research Network, a state-funded collaboration of university researchers. The North Carolina State General Assembly invested $50 million to inventory PFAS across every public drinking water source in the state, identify where the chemicals are coming from, and help develop solutions to reduce exposure.

Lee’s lab serves as the network’s main high-resolution mass spectrometry hub, analyzing water samples collected statewide.

“We constantly realized we weren’t seeing the full picture,” Lee said. “We wanted to see everything.”

At best, the team estimated it could generate structural information for only about 60 percent to 80 percent of the PFAS detected. Without the missing information, scientists could not confidently identify specific chemicals.

That changed in April 2024, when Lee’s lab installed the Orbitrap Astral.

“When the Orbitrap Astral (MS) came out in 2023, I immediately realized this was a key technology if we could get it in our hands,” he said. “Almost right away, we started observing compounds we had never seen before.”

Previously, Lee’s lab often ran samples twice, once to identify unknown compounds and again, on a separate instrument, to quantify what they found. With the Orbitrap Astral, researchers can collect structural and quantitative information in a single run, reducing analysis time while expanding what they can detect, he said.

The Orbitrap Astral allows researchers to detect PFAS at concentrations five to ten times lower than previously possible and to identify their molecular structures simultaneously. That matters when scientists are dealing with a family of more than 10,000 related chemicals, many of which are not yet regulated or well understood.

He describes the difference in simple terms: “If earlier technology was like seeing 100 times better than the naked eye, this is more like seeing 1,000 times better. And we’re not just seeing deeper, we’re seeing a much wider field of view, with greater accuracy.

Lee Ferguson, Ph.D., an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Duke University.

Tracing the source of contamination

Some of the first water samples analyzed using the Orbitrap Astral revealed chemicals from firefighting foam, a known source of PFAS contamination. But the team also saw something they hadn’t been looking for – a molecule related to chemicals used as electrolytes in lithium-ion batteries.

That finding opened another line of research: PFAS linked to battery manufacturing and disposal and their environmental impact. That research, detailed in an article published last year in Nature Communications, showed how certain PFAS molecules used in the manufacture of batteries were found to persist in the local environment, including soil and drinking water, raising new concerns as demand for lithium-ion batteries grows with the expansion of electric vehicles and renewable energy storage.

Further investigation revealed that some of these battery-related PFAS may persist in landfill leachate, a previously underrecognized pathway through which contaminants can enter wastewater streams.

“That whole line of research would have been much more difficult to pursue if it weren’t for the Orbitrap Astral,” Lee said.

Beyond discovery, the improved molecular detail is helping researchers trace contamination back to its source.

By building a detailed chemical “fingerprint” library of PFAS found in firefighting foams and other materials, scientists can compare those signatures with those detected in water samples to help identify likely sources of contamination.

The NC PFAS Research Network is also focused on solutions.

A Duke University spinoff company is using supercritical water oxidation, a process that subjects PFAS to extreme heat and pressure, converting them to compounds such as carbon dioxide, fluoride and water.

“That technology is being applied to destroy concentrated waste,” Lee said, “including firefighting foam and landfill leachate.”

For Lee, the stakes are clear.

“If you can’t see the problem,” he said, “you can’t fix it.”

General Laboratory Equipment – Not For Diagnostic Procedures. Thermo Scientific™ general lab equipment, consumables, and software are not intended for in vitro diagnostic purposes in accordance with our product documentation, manuals, and labels. They are designated for General Laboratory Use Only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures. These products have not been tested or validated for such applications and their use for in vitro diagnostic purposes may result in inaccurate results and, more seriously, health and safety risks. They are designated (designed, intended) for research, academic and industrial purposes.