Abstract
Metal oxides comprise a large group of chemicals used in water treatment to adsorb organic pollutants. The ability of titanium dioxide (TiO2) and iron (III) oxide (Fe2O3) to reduce the chronic toxicity of (phenolic) C6H6(OH)2 isomers, namely hydroquinone (HQ) and catechol (CAT) to Ceriodaphnia dubia and Pimephales promelas (less than 24 h-old) were investigated. The toxic endpoints following metal oxide treatment were compared to endpoints of untreated CAT and HQ. In chronic toxicity testing, HQ resulted in greater toxicity than CAT for both test organisms; the median lethal concentrations (LC50) for CAT were 3.66 to 12.36 mg.L−1 for C. dubia and P. promelas, respectively, while LC50 for HQ were 0.07 to 0.05 mg.L−1, respectively. Although both treated solutions presented lower toxic endpoints than those in the untreated solutions, Fe2O3 had a better potential to reduce the toxic effects of CAT and HQ than TiO2.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Ecotoxicology Research Facility, (ERF) (Jonesboro, AR, USA) and Arkansas Economic Development Commission (AEDC) (Jonesboro, AR, USA).
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MKA: Acquisition of data, data curation, visualization, investigation, formal analysis, writing—original draft, HMA: Funding acquisition, supervision, project administration, review & editing; JAC: Participated in the data acquisition; AMA-F: Review and analysis; JLB: Formal analysis, funding acquisition, investigation, methodology, project administration, resources, software, supervision, validation, and editing.
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Abugazleh, M.K., Ali, H.M., Chester, J.A. et al. Aquatic toxicity of hydroquinone and catechol following metal oxide treatment to Ceriodaphnia dubia and Pimephales promelas. Ecotoxicology 32, 656–665 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-023-02672-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-023-02672-5