Gadolinium as an Emerging Microcontaminant in Water Resources: Threats and Opportunities

Abstract

As a result of high doses of paramagnetic gadolinium (Gd) chelates administered in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) exams, their unmetabolized excretion, and insufficient removal in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs), large amounts of anthropogenic Gd (Gdanth) are released into surface water. The upward trend of gadolinium-based contrast agent (Gd-CA) administrations is expected to continue growing and consequently higher and higher anthropogenic Gd concentrations are annually recorded in water resources, which can pose a great threat to aquatic organisms and human beings. In addition, the feasibility of Gd retention in patients administered with Gd-CAs repeatedly, and even potentially fatal diseases, including nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NSF), due to trace amounts of Gd have recently arisen severe health concerns. Thus, there is a need to investigate probable adverse health effects of currently marketed Gd-CAs meticulously and to modify the actual approach in using Gd contrast media in daily practice in order to minimize unknown possible health risks. Furthermore, the employment of enhanced wastewater treatment processes that are capable of removing the stable contrast agents, and the evaluation of the ecotoxicity of Gd chelates and human exposure to these emerging contaminants through dermal and ingestion pathways deserve more attention. On the other hand, point source releases of anthropogenic Gd into the aquatic environment presents the opportunity to assess surface water—groundwater interactions and trace the fate of wastewater plume as a proxy for the potential presence of other microcontaminants associated with treated wastewater in freshwater and marine systems.

Evaluation and Predictive Modeling of Removal Condition for Bioadsorption of Indigo Blue Dye by Spirulina platensis

“…Only two species of microalgae have been tested for the removal of the indigo blue (Spirulina platensis here and Scenedesmus quadricauda [15]). Both were able to achieve removals between 90% and 100%.…”

“…Nevertheless, recent progress has been made in an integrated perspective of wastewater treatment that includes standard and biological technologies for pharmaceutical emerging contaminants [4][5][6][7], industrial chemicals [8,9], brewery wastewater [10], agro-industrial wastewater [11,12], heavy metals [13,14], and emerging compounds [15].…”

Potential Anthropogenic Pollution of High-technology Metals with a Focus on Rare Earth Elements in Environmental Water

“…[35][36][37] In recent years, utilization of high technology metals such as rare earth elements (REEs), whose abundance are extremely low in the earth, has rapidly increased with development of new types of industrial materials and pharmaceutical products. 38,39 In pollution may occur. Thus, we became interested in the research for a new type of potential anthropogenic pollution of high-technology metals with a focus on REEs in environmental water.…”

“…Eu and Tb. 15,39, This was artificially caused by anthropogenic sources mainly due to use of Gd compounds used as a contrast reagent for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in medical diagnosis.…”

Origin, distribution, and behaviour of rare earth elements in river bed sediments from a carbonate semi-arid basin (Tafna River, Algeria)

“…Even if Gd is mainly transported as a dissolved fraction (Kulaksiz and Bau, 2013), according to Migaszewski and Gałuszka (2015) the origin and mechanisms of controlling the LREE, MREE, or HREE enrichment in soluble and solid fractions are still unknown. It is particularly unclear whether the REE patterns are linked to the aqueous processes or are related to the source of these elements (Ebrahimi and Barbieri, 2019). In recent reviews, Rogowska et al (2018) reported the scarcity of information on the level of Gd in aquatic sediments and the lack of any speciation analysis (China, Australia, Europe) and Migaszewski and Gałuszka et al (2015) highlighted the need to improve our knowledge about behaviour and origin of REE in the environment.…”