Methods of analysis by the U.S. Geological Survey National Water Quality Laboratory-Determination of inorganic and organic constituents in water and fluvial sediments

Methods to be used to analyze samples of water, suspended sediment and bottom material for their content of inorganic and organic constituents are presented. Technology continually changes, and so this laboratory manual includes new and revised methods for determining the concentration of dissolved constituents in water, whole water recoverable constituents in water-suspended sediment samples, and recoverable concentration of constit- uents in bottom material. For each method, the general topics covered are the application, the principle of the method, interferences, the apparatus and reagents required, a detailed description of the analytical procedure, reporting results, units and significant figures, and analytical precision data. Included in this manual are 30 methods.