From pesticides to frogs’ legs – research stay in China
Posted with text and photos by Hanna Joerss, Célia Patricia Martins Bento and Andreas Wittmann
Time is flying and the last week of our one-month research visit at the Yantai Institute of Coastal Zone Research in China has already started. Us, that’s Andreas, Hanna and Célia, master’s student, PhD student and postdoc in the Department for Environmental Chemistry.
The aim of our stay is to collect and pretreat water and sediment samples for the analysis of organic pollutants, especially pesticides and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. To cover different parts of the environmental transport pathways, sampling locations include rivers close to point sources, river mouths as well as the receiving Bohai Sea. The results will be compared to Germany, in particular with regard to different environmental regulations and the stage of industrialization of the two countries.
We look back to exciting weeks in which we put these plans into action and gained insight into the work of our partner institution: Difficulties with getting our boxes with material from Germany to China, a road trip to the countryside to take river samples, deciphering Chinese sample labels, lab work, a visit to the institute’s research vessel Innovation I, participation in a workshop on sediment dynamics of Chinese estuaries and muddy coasts…
Bildergalerie
Our Chinese hosts made the realization of all this possible and made us feel welcome not only on a basis of work. They also shared part of their culture and traditions with us, from hotpot, frogs’ legs and noodle soup to places to see and karaoke singing.
Now it’s time to finish the last samples, pack our boxes which have to be sent back to Germany and say goodbye to the people we met here. 多谢. 我们們玩得很快活 – Thanks a lot, we had a great time!
