Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in agricultural soils from Ningde, China: levels, sources, and human health risk assessment

Abstract

Soil-bound polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in farmland are critical to human health. The level, composition, source, and cancer risk of sixteen PAHs in agricultural soil from Ningde, China, were investigated. The results indicated that the total concentrations of 16 PAHs ranged from 77.3 to 1188 ng g, with a mean value of 406 ng g. Five-ring PAHs were found to have the highest concentrations (148 ± 133 ng g), followed by four-ring (120 ± 101 ng g), three-ring (61.9 ± 54.2 ng g), six-ring (44.6 ± 61.0 ng g), and two-ring (31.3 ± 31.0 ng g). Employing positive matrix factorization (PMF), four PAH sources including biomass burning (36.3%), coal combustion (35.5%), traffic emissions (16.4%), and coke source (11.8%) were identified. Incremental lifetime cancer risk (ILCR) results showed that ILCR values ranged from 7.1 × 10 to 1.1 × 10, which will cause moderate-to-high cancer risk to human health mainly via the soil ingestion and dermal contact exposure pathways. The source-oriented results indicated that coal combustion (32.7%), traffic emission (34.3%), and biomass burning (32.4%) had similar contributions to the total cancer risk. Therefore, more attention should be paid to these pyrolysis-originated sources to protect humanity from the health risk of PAHs.

Facile Functionalization via Plasma-Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition for the Effective Filtration of Oily Aerosol

“…The World Health Organization (WHO) has reported that the ambient air pollution accounts for an annual death of about 4.2 million in 2016 by various chronic respiratory diseases [1]. Especially the Southeast Asia region, such as China and Korea, suffers a lot from the severe pollution caused by the airborne particles that consist of a mixture of fine dust, liquid mist, volatile organic compounds and possibly microbials [2,3,4,5]. The health risks associated with the airborne particles become serious for the particle size less than 2.5 µm, as such fine matters can even reach the bloodstream [3].…”

Design of Web-to-Web Spacing for the Reduced Pressure Drop and Effective Depth Filtration

“…Particulate matter (PM), consisting of solid particles, liquid aerosol, and gas and vapor compounds [1,2,3], is often classified by its aerodynamic diameter. PM 2.5, of which aerodynamic diameter ≤2.5 µm, is particularly reported as a serious threat to human health by the World Health Organization [4], because such an extremely small PM can be inhaled through respiratory organs, and then, circulated in the human body through blood vessels, potentially causing serious health problems [5,6,7,8,9,10].…”

Distribution, Origins and Hazardous Effects of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons in Topsoil Surrounding Oil Fields: A Case Study on the Loess Plateau, China

“…Therefore, factor 1 was marked as related to petroleum sources. ANT, PHE, and FLU, which are believed to be the tracers of wood/grass burning, dominated factor 2, which accounted for 18.75% of the total PAHs [33][34][35][36][37]. Hence, factor 2 was identified as originating from burning of biomass.…”