Total dissolution and digestion methods for engineered metal nanoparticles

The application of engineered nanoparticles (ENPs) may lead to an increased occurrence in the environment. To assess the risk of metal NPs and to understand their behavior in the environment in different matrices ecotoxicological tests are required. For clear-cut conclusions it is often inevitable to quantify the total amount of added ENPs to the test systems. To achieve this task we developed different approaches for total dissolution and digestion of an assortment of metal NPs in various matrices. In this contribution the methods are described and performance charac teristics are presented.