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Human Milk and Xenobiotics

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Handbook of Bioanalytics

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Abstract

Human milk as the golden standard of nutrition is fundamental nourishment for the newborn baby. Due to the fact that it contains essential ingredients such as proteins, fatty acids, carbohydrates, micro- and macroelements, and others, it affects proper development of infants. However, it also contains secretions from the mother’s body, in which there may be impurities accumulated in her organism and that will be excreted into precious milk. Therefore, the main aim of the following chapter was to characterize the impurities that could potentially be present in breast milk. These impurities include organic contaminations, such as polychlorinated biphenyls, brominated flame retardants, parabens, bisphenols, and perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances. Furthermore milk may be contaminated also by heavy metals, mycotoxins, and pharmaceutical residues. The challenge for analytical chemistry is therefore to establish methods to monitor milk for these compounds. For these purposes in the presented chapter, attention is brought to the procedures used so far for identification and determination of these compounds in maternal milk with liquid and gas chromatography and solid-phase extraction or liquid-liquid extraction for sample preparation. However, due to the complex composition of the milk matrix, attention was also paid to new directions in analysis, including sample preparation method developed considering trends in miniaturization and synthesis of new sorption materials.

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Acknowledgments

The work is the result of the research project OPUS No. 2018/29/B/ST4/01681 funded by the National Science Centre.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Environmental Chemistry and Bioanalytics, Faculty of Chemistry, Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Toruń, Poland

    Renata Gadzała-Kopciuch & Martyna Pajewska-Szmyt

  2. Centre for Modern Interdisciplinary Technologies, Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Toruń, Poland

    Renata Gadzała-Kopciuch & Martyna Pajewska-Szmyt

Authors
  1. Renata Gadzała-Kopciuch
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  2. Martyna Pajewska-Szmyt
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Renata Gadzała-Kopciuch .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Environmental Chemistry and Bioanalytics, Nicolaus Copernicus University, Torun, Poland

    Bogusław Buszewski

  2. Department of Inorganic Chemistry, Analytical Chemistry and Electrochemistry, Faculty of Chemistry, Silesian University of Technology, Gliwice, Poland

    Irena Baranowska

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Gadzała-Kopciuch, R., Pajewska-Szmyt, M. (2022). Human Milk and Xenobiotics. In: Buszewski, B., Baranowska, I. (eds) Handbook of Bioanalytics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-95660-8_14

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