Environmental research is detecting ever more pharmaceutical residues in the aquatic environment as analytical methods become increasingly sensitive. The physicochemical properties of some active substances suggest an accumulation in sediment, suspended matter and biota. Hence, these matrices could be interesting alternative matrices for monitoring of pharmaceutical residues in surface waters. Against this background, modern analytical detection methods for different matrices from water to sediment and suspended matter to biota (fish) were developed and published in 2019 (FKZ 3715 67 413). In the current project sampling concepts were combined with retrospective analyses. In this report, the results of the developed methods from investigations of water, sediment, suspended matter and biota samples from different locations and the German environmental specimen bank are presented in terms of occurrence and distribution.

During the project 3 articles have been published: Boulard et al. 2018 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chroma.2017.12.023), Boulard et al. 2020 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2019.115366), Boulard et al. 2020 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chroma.2020.461612).