I am degrading pharmaceutical pollutants in distilled water at 2mg/L using TiO2. Distilled water has been tested to be of high quality. The initial sample (before degradation) has been confirmed to be within the range of 2mg/L using HPLC-MS. Total degradation of the analyte has also been proven after few hours of degradation experiments, using HPLC-MS. My biggest issue now is TOC. I get a higher TOC than what should be in the initial sample (in most cases about 5mg/L) and the TOC increases after degradation in many cases by 5 times. This has caused a setback in my project as proof of mineralization can be illustrated using the TOC results. Has anyone experienced this before? Does anyone have an expert opinion on this?

Thank you.

Bukola.