Total Carbon

Relationship of carbon-content categories

Total Carbon is an analytical measurement for carbon content. This measurement commonly found in environmental and pharmaceutical analysis.

Carbon Content Categories

A variety of different terms are used to identify the different types of carbon present at different levels of detail.

• Total Carbon (TC) – all the carbon in the sample, including both inorganic and organic carbon
• Total Inorganic Carbon (TIC) – often referred to as inorganic carbon (IC), carbonate, bicarbonate, and dissolved carbon dioxide (CO₂).
• Total Organic Carbon (TOC) – material derived from decaying vegetation, bacterial growth, and metabolic activities of living organisms or chemicals.
• Elemental Carbon (EC) – charcoal, coal, and soot. Resistant to analytical digestion and extraction, EC can be a fraction of either TIC or TOC depending on analytical approach.^[1]
• Non-Purgeable Organic Carbon (NPOC) – commonly referred to as TOC; organic carbon remaining in an acidified sample after purging the sample with gas.
• Purgeable (volatile) Organic Compound (VOC) – organic carbon that has been removed from a neutral, or acidified sample by purging with an inert gas. These are the same compounds referred to as Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC) and usually determined by Purge and Trap Gas Chromatography.
• Dissolved Organic Carbon (DOC) – organic carbon remaining in a sample after filtering the sample, typically using a 0.45 micrometer filter.
• Suspended Organic Carbon – also called particulate organic carbon (POC); the carbon in particulate form that is too large to pass through a filter.

References

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