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A pilot study of organophosphate esters in surface soils collected from Jinan City, China: implications for risk assessments

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Abstract

Data monitoring is a prerequisite for the occurrence of organophosphate esters (OPEs) in the soil environment in light of their potential toxicity, bioaccumulation, and environmental persistence. In this study, we determined the concentrations and profiles of OPEs in surface soils collected from Jinan City, East China. The soil concentrations of ΣOPE (sum of all OPEs) were in the range of 2.55–581 ng/g dry weight (dw), with an average value of 106 ng/g dw. Industrial soils (mean: 433 ng/g dw) had significantly higher levels of ΣOPE compared with those in urban (42.1 ng/g dw) and farmland soils (7.89 ng/g dw) (p < 0.01), suggesting that industrial activity is an important source of OPEs to ambient soil environment. Tris(1-chloro-2-propyl) phosphate (TCIPP), triphenyl phosphate (TPHP), and tris(2-butoxyethyl) phosphate (TBOEP) were the most abundant OPEs in industrial soils, contributing 30%, 25%, and 20% of ΣOPE, respectively. Principal component analysis revealed that TCIPP, TPHP, and TBOEP in soils derived from respective industrial activities. As compared with other cities within China, the surface soil of Jinan City was mildly contaminated by OPEs, and its human exposure and eco-toxicological risks were found to be negligible. Our study provides current contamination status of OPEs in soils across the multiple functional regions of Jinan, which could be used to support the authorities to make relevant regulations.

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Data availability

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on a reasonable request.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Hepatology, Qilu Hospital, Cheeloo Colledge of Medicine, Shandong University, Jinan, 250012, Shandong, China

    Yulian Sun

  2. Department of Pediatrics and Department of Environmental Medicine, New York University School of Medicine, 550 First Avenue, New York, NY, 10016, USA

    Hongkai Zhu

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  1. Yulian Sun
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Sun analyzed and interpreted the measured data regarding the occurrence of OPEs in soils and was a major contributor in writing the manuscript. Zhu performed the project supervision, writing review, and editing. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Hongkai Zhu.

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Responsible editor: Hongwen Sun

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ESM 1

The SI contains physicochemical properties (Table S1), geographic information (Table S2), MRM parameters (Table S3), QA/QC results (Table S4), principal component analysis (Table S5), spearman correlation coefficients (Table S6), and typical chromatograms (Fig. S1). (DOCX 201 kb)

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Sun, Y., Zhu, H. A pilot study of organophosphate esters in surface soils collected from Jinan City, China: implications for risk assessments. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 3344–3353 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-10730-2

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