Organic Matter Research Laboratory
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Welcome to the USGS CAWSC Organic Matter Research Laboratory (OMRL). The OMRL provides laboratory services and support to regional and national projects in the analysis of organic matter using the latest methods in absorbance and fluorescence spectroscopy along with standard measurement of total dissolved organic carbon and nitrogen concentration. Please contact us if you have any questions.
Collect and Submit a Sample
How to collect and submit a sample to the Organic Matter Research Lab.
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Publications
Procedures for using the Horiba Scientific Aqualog® fluorometer to measure absorbance and fluorescence from dissolved organic matter
Advances in spectroscopic techniques have led to an increase in the use of optical measurements (absorbance and fluorescence) to assess dissolved organic matter composition and infer sources and processing. Although optical measurements are easy to make, they can be affected by many variables rendering them less comparable, including by...
Hansen, Angela M.; Fleck, Jacob; Kraus, Tamara E. C.; Downing, Bryan D.; von Dessonneck, Travis; Bergamaschi, Brian
Wetlands receiving water treated with coagulants improve water quality by removing dissolved organic carbon and disinfection byproduct precursors
Constructed wetlands are used worldwide to improve water quality while also providing critical wetland habitat. However, wetlands have the potential to negatively impact drinking water quality by exporting dissolved organic carbon (DOC) that upon disinfection can form disinfection byproducts (DBPs) like trihalomethanes (...
Hansen, Angela M.; Kraus, Tamara E. C.; Bachand, Sandra M.; Horwath, William R.; Bachand, Philip A.M. Optical properties of dissolved organic matter (DOM): Effects of biological and photolytic degradation
Advances in spectroscopic techniques have led to an increase in the use of optical properties (absorbance and fluorescence) to assess dissolved organic matter (DOM) composition and infer sources and processing. However, little information is available to assess the impact of biological and photolytic processing on the optical properties of...
Hansen, Angela; Kraus, Tamara E. C.; Pellerin, Brian; Fleck, Jacob; Downing, Bryan D.; Bergamaschi, Brian