Exposure and risk assessment of urinary trans, trans-Muconic acid in school-age children in the vicinity of a petrochemical complex in Central Taiwan.

School-age children living near large petrochemical factories may be at high risk of exposure to benzene released during manufacturing processes. We aimed to investigate the urinary concentrations of trans, trans-muconic acid (t,t-MA) in school-age children living near a petrochemical complex and to estimate their cumulative risk of benzene exposure. We examined an established cohort (Taiwan Petrochemical Complex Cohort for Children, TPE3C) of school-age children (aged 6-13 years) who lived near large petrochemical factories in central Taiwan between October 2013 and September 2014. The cohort comprised 297 children from five elementary schools, namely S.-C. Branch (n = 63, school A, ~0.9 km), F.-A. (n = 51, school B, ~2.7 km), C.-T. (n = 63, school C, ~5.5 km), M.-L. (n = 54, school D, ~6.9 km), and L.-F. (n = 66, school E, ~8.6 km). We analyzed the urinary t,t-MA levels of each participant and estimated their daily intake of benzene. We also performed multiple regression analysis to investigate potential risk factors for a high urinary t,t-MA level in the study cohort. The median urinary t,t-MA levels and median estimated benzene daily intake of the children from each school were as follows: school A, 64.07 ng/mL, 11.13 µg/kg/day; school B, 61.01 ng/mL, 15.32 µg/kg/day; school C, 59.38 ng/mL, 14.81 µg/kg/day; school D, 42.35 ng/mL, 11.67 µg/kg/day; school E, undetected, 0.14 µg/kg/day. The distance between a school and a petrochemical complex (greater distance: ß = -0.26, 95% confidence interval [CI] = -0.52 to 0.00, p = 0.053), and the age of the children (older age: ß = -3.44, 95% CI = -5.90 to -1.46, p < 0.001) were identified as potential risk factors. After confounders were adjusted for, the creatinine adjusted urinary t,t-MA levels of the school-age children tended to be lower when the distance between their school and a petrochemical complex was greater.

Exposure Characteristics and Cumulative Risk Assessment for Phthalates in Children Living near a Petrochemical Complex.

BACKGROUND: School-aged children living near plastics-producing factories may have higher risk of exposure to phthalates released during the manufacturing processes. OBJECTIVES: We aimed to investigate the urinary concentrations of phthalate metabolites in school-aged children living near a petrochemical complex and estimate the cumulative risk of phthalate exposure. METHODS: We used a well-established cohort (Taiwan Petrochemical Complex Cohort for Children, TPE3C) of school-aged children (6-13 years old) living near polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) factories in central Taiwan from October 2013 to September 2014. A total of 257 children were included from five elementary schools: Syu-Cuo Branch (n = 58, school A, ~0.9 km), Feng-An (n = 40, school B, ~2.7 km), Ciao-Tou (n = 58, school C, ~5.5 km), Mai-Liao (n = 37, school D, ~6.9 km), and Lung-Feng (n = 57, school E, ~8.6 km). We analyzed 11 metabolites of seven phthalates (including di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) and di-n-butyl phthalate (DnBP)) in urine. Daily intakes (DIs) were compared with acceptable intake levels to calculate the hazard quotient (HQ) for individual phthalates, and the cumulative risk for each child was assessed using a hazard index (HI), which was the sum of the the individual HQs. RESULTS: The geometric mean and proportion of participants with HIs exceeding one for hepatic (HIhep) and reproductive (HIrep) effects were 0.33 (13.2%) and 0.24 (7.8%), respectively. The major contributors to phthalate exposure risk were DEHP, di-iso-butyl phthalate (DiBP) and DnBP in all children. Moreover, we observed a U shaped distribution of DEHP exposure by school distance from the PVC and VCM factories (school A: 7.48 µg/kg/day and school E: 80.44 µg/kg/day). This may be due to emissions (closest) and and being located downwind of PVC scrap incineration (farthest). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that children living near a petrochemical complex were at a greater risk of phthalate exposure than normal school-aged children and that phthalate exposure was mainly attributed to DEHP, DiBP and DnBP. In addition, inhalation may have been a risk factor for people living near to PVC and VCM factories.

A low-cost eco-friendly fast drug extraction (FaDEx) technique for environmental and bio-monitoring of psychoactive drug in urban water and sports-persons' urine samples.

Nicotine is the most prominent psychoactive/addictive chemical substance consumed worldwide among young players in team sports. Moreover, urinary nicotine discharge and nicotine-based products disposal in environmental waters has been unavoidable in recent years. Therefore, sensitive monitoring of nicotine content in environmental waters and human urine samples is essential. In this study, we developed a miniaturized novel green, low-cost, sensitive, in-syringe-based semi-automated fast drug extraction (FaDEx) protocol coupled with gas chromatography-flame ionization detection (GC-FID) for the efficient environmental and bio-monitoring of nicotine in aqueous samples. The FaDEx method consists of two steps; firstly, the target analyte was extracted using dimethyl carbonate (a green solvent) and extraction salts. After that, the extraction solvent was passed automatically through the solid-phase extraction cartridge at a constant flow rate for the cleanup process to achieve the sensitive nicotine analysis by GC-FID. Under optimized experimental conditions, the developed method showed excellent linearity over the concentration ranges between 20-2000 ng mL-1 with a correlation coefficient >0.99. The detection and quantification limits were 4 and 20 ng mL-1, respectively. The presented method was applied to monitor and assess nicotine exposure in sports-persons' urine and environmental water samples. The method accuracy and precision in terms of relative recovery and relative standard deviation (for triplicate analysis) were 85.4-110.2% and ≤8%, respectively. Finally, the impact of our procedure on the environment from a green analytical chemistry view was assessed using a novel metric system called AGREE, and obtained the greenness score of 0.87, indicating its an efficient alternative green analytical protocol for routine environmental and bio-monitoring of nicotine in environmental and biological samples.

Microalgae cultivation strategies using cost-effective nutrient sources: Recent updates and progress towards biofuel production.

Scientists are grabbing huge attention as well as consciousness on non-renewable energy sources for the global energy crises because of gradual increase in oil price, fast depletion or low availability of resources, and the release of more toxic-gases (CO2, SOx, NxO) during exhaustion, etc. Due to such hitches, the key need is to find alternative biofuels or feedstocks to replace fossil fuel energy demands worldwide. Currently, microalgae have become intrigued feedstock candidates (3rd generation source of biofuel) to replace nearly 50-60 % of fossil fuels due to high production of biomass and oil, mitigating CO2 and wastewater remediation. The present work demonstrated the current developments and future perspectives on large-scale algal cultivation strategies for the biorefinery economy. In addition, various advanced cultivation techniques adopted for enhanced biomass production and cost-effective methods for bioenergy production were detailly discussed.

Low-cost disposable Poly(ethyleneimine)-Functionalized Carbon Nanofibers Coated Cellulose Paper as efficient solid phase extraction sorbent material for the extraction of Parahydroxybenzoates from environmental waters.

Parahydroxybenzoates (parabens) are considered as emerging environmental contaminants because of their extensive usage in our daily life products, causing parabens contamination into environmental water systems and lead to toxic effects on environmental health. This study describes a greener extraction method using a new cationic polymer poly (ethyleneimine) functionalized acid-treated carbon nanofibers (PEI-CNFs) coated cellulose paper (CP) as solid-phase extraction (SPE) sorbent material for the extraction of parabens from environmental water samples. The fabrication of PEI-CNFs modified CP was confirmed using field-emission scanning electron microscope, transmission electron microscopy, and fourier-transformer infrared spectroscopy techniques. Various factors affecting the adsorption and desorption of parabens on PEI-CNFs@CP and its extraction efficiencies were studied using HPLC-UV analysis. Under the optimal experimental conditions, maximum extraction efficiencies were achieved for four target parabens, and PEI-CNFs@CP/HPLC-UV method exhibited excellent linearities ranged from 0.5-50 ng mL-1 with regression coefficient values were between 0.9952-0.9970. The presented method showed good sensitivity with quantification limits between 0.5-0.75 ng mL-1 and detection limits between 0.1-0.25 ng mL-1. The developed technique was applied for the real sample analysis (river, lake, domestic sewage water, and drinking tap water). The spiked recovery revealed good recoveries between 86.8-116.0% with RSD less than 8.8% for all the water samples. These results proved that it a simple, fast, efficient, low-cost, and eco-friendly method for the extraction and determination of parabens in environmental water samples and can be applied as a routine analytical tool in environmental monitoring and quality control laboratories.

Rapid and sensitive analytical procedure for biomonitoring of organophosphate pesticide metabolites in human urine samples using a vortex-assisted salt-induced liquid-liquid microextraction technique coupled with ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry.

RATIONALE: Organophosphate pesticides (OPPs) are the most commonly used insecticides around the world in various agricultural and domestic practices, and humans are frequently exposed to these hazardous insecticides that can lead to several chronic health effects. Therefore, a fast and sensitive analytical method is required for biomonitoring the markers of OPPs in humans for exposure estimation. In this study, a fast and sensitive analytical procedure was developed for the determination of the metabolites of OPPs in human urine samples. METHODS: Metabolites of OPPs were extracted from 2 mL of urine sample using a novel vortex-assisted salt-induced liquid-liquid microextraction (VA-SI-LLME) technique, and the preconcentrated metabolites were analyzed by ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC/MS/MS). Various factors affecting the efficiency of VA-SI-LLME were thoroughly investigated. RESULTS: The metabolites of OPPs exhibited very good linearity over the concentration range between 0.05 and 50 ng mL-1 with coefficient (r2 ) values ranging between 0.9986 and 0.9999. The method showed excellent sensitivity with detection limits ranging from 0.01 to 0.03 ng mL-1 and quantification limits from 0.03 to 0.05 ng mL-1 . The developed method was applied to the analysis of real samples and the recoveries ranged between 85.0 and 114.1% with related standard deviations <5%. CONCLUSIONS: The results showed the VA-SI-LLME/UHPLC/MS/MS method to be a simple, rapid, sensitive, and selective analytical procedure for the biomonitoring of the metabolites of OPPs in humans. This efficient and cost-effective analytical method could be a potential alternative method for the biomonitoring of the metabolites of pesticides in humans.