Isolation of Dissolved Organic Matter from the Suwannee River Using Reverse Osmosis

摘要

A portable reverse osmosis (RO) system was constructed and used to concentrate dissolved organic matter (DOM) from the Suwannee River in southeastern Georgia. Using this RO system, 150-180 l/h of river water could be processed with 90% recovery of DOM. After further cation exchange and lyophilization of the concentrated river water samples, large quantities of low-ash freeze-dried products were isolated. The authors highly recommend this RO method for concentration of DOM in fresh waters because (1) a very high percentage of DOM is recovered, which indicates minimal fractionation of the original sample, and (2) the process is quite rapid, which permits large quantities of DOM to be concentrated in a reasonable length of time.