Kokonaispitoisuutta

Kokonaispitoisuutta (partitive form of Finnish kokonaispitoisuus) literally means "total concentration." It is used in scientific and regulatory contexts to denote the combined amount of a substance present in a sample or system, irrespective of chemical form or binding state. Common English equivalents include "total concentration" or "total content."

In chemistry, environmental science and medicine, kokonaispitoisuutta refers to measures such as total nitrogen, total phosphorus, total organic carbon (TOC) or total drug concentration in blood. It contrasts with measures of free, dissolved, or speciated fractions; for example, total metal concentration includes both particulate and dissolved forms. Determination often requires sample digestion or extraction followed by analytical techniques like spectrophotometry, chromatography, atomic absorption/emission, or mass spectrometry. Units depend on context (mol/L, mg/L, µg/m3, mg/kg).

Regulatory and monitoring programs use total concentrations to assess compliance with limits, evaluate pollution loads, or determine exposure. Interpretation requires attention to matrix effects, method detection limits, recovery, and whether results reflect bioavailable fraction or simply total mass. Linguistically, kokonaispitoisuus combines Finnish kokonais- ("whole, total") and pitoisuus ("concentration"). The partitive form kokonaispitoisuutta appears in Finnish sentences when expressing quantities, comparisons or requests for measurements.