Studio analitico HPLC-HRMS per la determinazione della degradazione del gabapentin sottoposto a fotocatalisi eterogenea e sua relativa valutazione in un reale Impianto di Depurazione delle Acque Reflue

Environmental chemistry is a discipline that combines the application of the principles of chemistry with the great demand that mankind faces, such as maintaining and improving the quality of the environment. In the last decades the production of large quantities of a variety of materials and chemical compounds has determined a standard of life and quality of life without precedents. However this has a price in terms of pollution and environmental degradation. A large branch of environmental chemistry is focused on water pollution. For example, when we take a drug we think it to be confined in our body but we do not have concern about its fate once we eliminate it through the urine. In fact, together with cosmetics, drugs are among the main significant new water pollutants because, unlike simpler organic molecules, they are the most difficult to degrade. Another problem is that, once arrived in the water, drugs can react in different ways (through reactions of hydrolysis, oxidation, etc.) and are transformed into molecules (or secondary products) that could be more toxic than the parent compound. My thesis project is based on the study of degradation kinetics of gabapentin, (an anti-epileptic drug) and on its degradation products by the use of methods such as HPLC-HRMS after simulation degradation by heterogeneous photocatalysis. With this study I was able to identify XX new degradants formed from gabapentin. The same study has already been carried out on other organic biomolecules (such as anticancer and anti-inflammatory drugs, nicotine, caffeine, etc ..) but unlike other compounds, we noticed that Gabapentin, (that has a particularly small and stable chemical structure), is recalcitrant to degradation and this requiring a long time to be completely degraded. The study carried out in Italy was continued in Stuttgart where I worked in a experimental WWTP (Wastewater Treatment Plant) in order to evaluate the concentration of Gabapentin and kinetics in its degradation products at different treatment stages. Together with Gabapentin I was able to estimate the concentration of different drugs such as sulfamethoxazole, carbamazepine and others. We were able to evaluate the presence of drug molecules at the beginning and at the end of the water purification treatment.