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Occurrence of Endocrine-Disrupting Phenols and Estrogens in Water and Sediment of the Songhua River, Northeastern China

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Abstract

Concentrations of six phenolic endocrine-disrupting chemicals [4-tert-octylphenol (OP), 4-t-nonylphenol (4-t-NP), 4-n-nonylphenol (4-n-NP), nonylphenol mono- to di-ethoxylates (NP1EO, NP2EO), and bisphenol A (BPA)] and five estrogens [estrone (E1), β-estradiol (E2), estriol (E3) 17α-ethynylestradiol (EE2), and diethylstilbestrol (DES)] were determined in surface water and sediment samples collected from the Songhua River in northeast China. Concentrations of sum of five alkylphenols and alkylphenol ethoxylates (ΣOP, 4-n-NP, 4-t-NP, NP1EO, NP2EO) were 117–1,030 ng L−1 (mean 296) in water samples and 25.5–386 ng g−1 (mean 67.3 ng g−1 dry weight (dw)) in sediments. Concentrations of BPA in water and sediments were 8.24–263 ng L−1 (mean 52.0) and 1.60–17.3 ng g−1 dw (mean 4.90 dw), respectively. Concentrations in water were 0.840–20.8 ng L−1 (mean 5.03) for the sum of three natural steroidal estrogens (ΣE1, E2, E3) and below detection limit (BDL) at −1.38 ng L−1 (average 0.200) for the sum of two synthetic estrogens (EE2, ΣDES). Among estrogens, only E1 was detected in all of the sediment samples in the range of 0.100–3.00 ng g−1 dw. Concentrations of Σphenolic EDCs and Σestrogens in water and sediments and their correlations with total organic carbon indicated that these contaminants originate from similar sources, such as municipal wastewater. In situ \(\log K_{oc}^{\prime }\) values and sediment–water fugacity fraction were calculated for the target chemicals, and the results indicated that these chemicals were, in general, supersaturated in sediments relative to those in water.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful for financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants No. 21207026 and 21107020) and the Shanghai Tongji Gao Tingyao Environmental Science and Technology Development Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Urban Water Resource and Environment, International Joint Research Center for Persistent Toxic Substances, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150090, China

    Zifeng Zhang, Nanqi Ren, Kurunthachalam Kannan, Jun Nan, Liyan Liu, Wanli Ma, Hong Qi & Yifan Li

  2. Department of Environmental Health Sciences, New York State Department of Health, Wadsworth Center, School of Public Health, State University of New York at Albany, Albany, NY, USA

    Kurunthachalam Kannan

  3. Science and Technology Branch, Environment Canada, Toronto, ON, M3H 5T4, Canada

    Zifeng Zhang & Yifan Li

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  1. Zifeng Zhang
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  2. Nanqi Ren
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  3. Kurunthachalam Kannan
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  4. Jun Nan
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Correspondence to Hong Qi or Yifan Li.

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Zhang, Z., Ren, N., Kannan, K. et al. Occurrence of Endocrine-Disrupting Phenols and Estrogens in Water and Sediment of the Songhua River, Northeastern China. Arch Environ Contam Toxicol 66, 361–369 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00244-014-9998-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00244-014-9998-5

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