A comprehensive approach to quantify the source identification and human health risk assessment of toxic elements in park dust.

In this research, enrichment factor (EF) and pollution load index were utilized to explore the contamination characteristics of toxic elements (TEs) in park dust. The results exhibited that park dust in the study area was mainly moderately polluted, and the EF values of dust Cd, Zn, Pb, Cu and Sb were all > 1. The concentrations of Cr, Cu, Zn and Pb increased with the decrease of dust particle size. The investigation results of chemical speciation and bioavailability of TEs showed that Zn had the highest bioavailability. Three sources of TEs were determined by positive matrix factorization model, Pearson correlation analysis and geostatistical analysis, comprising factor 1 mixed sources of industrial and transportation activities (46.62%), factor 2 natural source (25.56%) and factor 3 mixed source of agricultural activities and the aging of park infrastructures (27.82%). Potential ecological risk (PER) and human health risk (HHR) models based on source apportionment were exploited to estimate PER and HHR of TEs from different sources. The mean PER value of TEs in the park dust was 114, indicating that ecological risk in the study area was relatively high. Factor 1 contributed the most to PER, and the pollution of Cd was the most serious. There were no significant carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic risks for children and adults in the study area. And factor 3 was the biggest source of non-carcinogenic risk, and As, Cr and Pb were the chief contributor to non-carcinogenic risk. The primary source of carcinogenic risk was factor 2, and Cr was the cardinal cancer risk element.

A comprehensive exploration on the health risk quantification assessment of soil potentially toxic elements from different sources around large-scale smelting area.

Non-ferrous metal smelting activities have always been considered as one of the foremost anthropogenic sources of potentially toxic elements (PTEs). The enrichment factor (EF) and pollution load index (PLI) were used to evaluate the pollution level of soil PTEs; positive matrix factorization (PMF), correlation analysis, and geostatistics were utilized to quantify the sources of soil PTEs; and potential ecological risk (PER) and human health risk (HHR) of different sources from farmland, construction land, and natural land were quantifiably determined via combined PTE sources with PER and HHR assessment models. Taking the smelting area of Daye City as an example, the evaluation results of EF and PLI showed that the soil PTE pollution in the study area was serious, especially Cd and Cu. And four sources were quantitatively allocated as agricultural practices (12.14%), traffic emissions (23.07%), natural sources (33.46%), and industrial activities (31.33%). For PER, industrial activities were the largest contributor to PER, accounting for 55.66%, 56.30%, and 55.36% of farmland, construction land, and natural land, respectively, and Cd was the most dangerous element. In terms of HHR, industrial activities were also the cardinal contributors under the three land use types. Children were exposed to serious non-carcinogenic risks under three land use patterns and slight carcinogenic risk in construction land (1.06E - 04). Significantly, the carcinogenic risk of children in farmland (9.06 × 10-5) was very close to the threshold (1 × 10-4), which requires attention. Both non-carcinogenic and carcinogenic risk for adults were all at acceptable levels. The health risks (carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic risks) of children from four different sources were distinctly higher than those of adults. Consequently, strict management and control of industrial activities should be given priority, and the management of agricultural practices should not be ignored.

Substantially improving the enantioconvergence of PvEH1, a Phaseolus vulgaris epoxide hydrolase, towards m-chlorostyrene oxide by laboratory evolution.

BACKGROUND: Epoxide hydrolase can regioselectively catalyze the oxirane ring-opening hydrolysis of rac-epoxides producing the corresponding chiral diols. In our laboratory, a gene named pveh1 encoding an EH from Phaseolus vulgaris was cloned. Although the directed modification of PvEH1 was carried out, the mutant PvEH1Y3 showed a limited degree of enantioconvergence towards racemic (rac-) m-chlorostyrene oxide (mCSO). RESULTS: PvEH1 and PvEH1Y3 were combinatively subjected to laboratory evolution to further enhance the enantioconvergence of PvEH1Y3 towards rac-mCSO. Firstly, the substrate-binding pocket of PvEH1 was identified using a CAVER 3.0 software, and divided into three zones. After all residues in zones 1 and 3 were subjected to leucine scanning, two E. coli transformants, E. coli/pveh1Y149L and /pveh1P184L, were selected, by which rac-mCSO was transformed into (R)-m-chlorophenyl-1,2-ethanediol (mCPED) having 55.1% and 27.2% eep. Secondly, two saturation mutagenesis libraries, E. coli/pveh1Y149X and /pveh1P184X (X: any one of 20 residues) were created at sites Y149 and P184 of PvEH1. Among all transformants, both E. coli/pveh1Y149L (65.8% αS and 55.1% eep) and /pveh1P184W (66.6% αS and 59.8% eep) possessed the highest enantioconvergences. Finally, the combinatorial mutagenesis was conducted by replacements of both Y149L and P184W in PvEH1Y3, constructing E. coli/pveh1Y3Z2, whose αS reached 97.5%, higher than that (75.3%) of E. coli/pveh1Y3. In addition, the enantioconvergent hydrolysis of 20 mM rac-mCSO was performed by E. coli/pveh1Y3Z2, giving (R)-mCPED with 95.2% eep and 97.2% yield. CONCLUSIONS: In summary, the enantioconvergence of PvEH1Y3Z2 was successfully improved by laboratory evolution, which was based on the study of substrate-binding pocket by leucine scanning. Our present work introduced an effective strategy for the directed modification of enantioconvergence of PvEH1.