Gas- and/or Liquid Chromatography- High Resolution Mass Spectrometry

Safer Chemicals

Center for Computational Toxicology and Exposure (CCTE)

Research Triangle Park, NC

12 months

There is a need to develop new methods and approaches that can generate exposure data on the growing number of chemicals in commercial use. CCTE’s Chemical Characterization and Exposure Division is developing suspect screening and non-targeted analysis (NTA) methods to gather xenobiotic data in a variety of environmental and biological media to understand the totality of lifetime exposures.

Non-targeted analysis (NTA) involves using instrumentation to accurately measure the mass of components in a sample, without any preconceived notion about what those components might be. NTA seeks the answer to “What's in this sample?” This internship opportunity seeks an individual to help develop one or more of the following: a) NTA instrumental analyses methods, b) practical approaches for the characterization and analyses of samples; c) approaches for data interpretation and data handling; d) prioritization strategies of detected features for identification; e) strategies for data storage, sharing and reporting.  We continue to increase the team of people working on this project; from chemists, to modelers and informaticists. The overall goal for non-targeted analysis projects are to develop a higher throughput workflow to rapidly provide exposure data for high impact projects (emergency response), models, and ultimately regulatory decision makers.

The participant will increase knowledge and skills in the use of gas- and/or liquid chromatography/high resolution mass spectrometry (QTOF and/or Orbitrap), develop non-targeted analysis skills, learn new computational approaches, and fine tune scientific writing.

Elin Ulrich, ulrich.elin@epa.gov