Characterization of Aquatic Organic Matter in a Natural Environment in Northeastern Brazil

Fluorophores in surface freshwaters: importance, likely structures, and possible impacts of climate change

“…14,34 Therefore, the consideration of both absorption and fluorescence spectra provides a considerable amount of information about the nature of organic matter in water samples. 35 The ability of some water constituents to emit fluorescence radiation has been extensively exploited, especially in the application of fluorescence spectroscopy to the characterisation of natural waters. Fluorescence spectroscopy has several advantages that account for its wide use: 36 (i) little expensive instrumentation that is widely accessible; (ii) high sensitivity of the fluorescence technique, which enables direct and fast characterisation of water samples without complicated and time-consuming extraction/enrichment procedures, which might also introduce biases, and (iii) very large literature available on the subject, which provides a wide set of references and standards with which to compare one own's data.…”