To screen for transformation products in environmental samples, liquid chromatography and/or ion mobility spectrometry hyphenated with mass spectrometry are used in non-target, suspect, and target approaches. Structural elucidation is performed using high-resolution mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Additionally, environmentally relevant transformation processes are simulated using purely instrumental setups, such as electrochemistry, photochemistry and other chemical simulation approaches.

Valentin´s work will also contribute to the Cluster of Excellence, WP 3.2. He received his PhD in analytical chemistry in the group of Prof. Dr. Uwe Karst at the University of Münster in Germany where his research focused on identifying electrochemical transformation products using mass spectrometry.