Rare earth elements (REE) are a homogenous group of 17 chemical elements in the periodic table that are key to many modern industries including chemicals, consumer electronics, clean energy, transportation, health care, aviation, and defense. Moreover, in recent years, they have been used in agriculture. One of the consequences of their worldwide use is the possible increase of their levels in various environmental compartments. This review addresses major topics concerning the study of REE in the soil environment, with special attention to the latest research findings. The main sources of REE to soils, the contents of REE in soils worldwide, and relevant information on the effects of REE to plants were explored. Ecological and human health risk issues related to the presence of REE in soils were also discussed. Although several findings reported positive effects of REE on plant growth, many questions about their biological role remain unanswered. Therefore, studies concerning the actual mechanism of action of these elements on cellular and physiological processes should be further refined. Even more urgent is to unveil their chemical behavior in soils and the ecological and human health risks that might be associated with the widespread use of REE in our modern society.

The elevated concentration of arsenic (As) in the groundwaters of many countries worldwide has received much attention during recent decades. This article presents an overview of the natural geochemical processes that mobilize As from aquifer sediments into groundwater and provides a concise description of the distribution of As in different global groundwater systems, with an emphasis on the highly vulnerable regions of Southeast Asia, the USA, Latin America, and Europe. Natural biogeochemical processes and anthropogenic activities may lead to the contamination of groundwaters by increased As concentrations. The primary source of As in groundwater is predominantly natural (geogenic) and mobilized through complex biogeochemical interactions within various aquifer solids and water. Sulfide minerals such as arsenopyrite and As-substituted pyrite, as well as other sulfide minerals, are susceptible to oxidation in the near-surface environment and quantitatively release significant quantities of As in the sediments. The geochemistry of As generally is a function of its multiple oxidation states, speciation, and redox transformation. The reductive dissolution of As-bearing Fe(III) oxides and sulfide oxidation are the most common and significant geochemical triggers that release As from aquifer sediments into groundwaters. The mobilization of As in groundwater is controlled by adsorption onto metal oxyhydroxides and clay minerals. According to recent estimates, more than 130 million people worldwide potentially are exposed to As in drinking water at levels above the World Health Organization’s (WHO's) guideline value of 10 μg/L. Hence, community education to strengthen public awareness, the involvement and capacity building of local stakeholders in targeting As-safe aquifers, and direct action and implementation of best practices in identifying safe groundwater sources for the installation of safe drinking water wells through action and enforcement by local governments and international water sector professionals are urgent necessities for sustainable As mitigation on a global scale.

This study reviews recent research on volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from motorized vehicle sources by means of online mass spectrometry. Chemical ionization is a powerful tool that usually permits soft ionization of chemical species and it allows the time-resolved measurement of multiple VOCs, even in complex samples where many kinds of VOCs coexist. The vehicular exhaust gasses are investigated using H₃O⁺, NO⁺, Hg⁺, and CH₃C(O)O⁻ as a reagent ion in online chemical ionization mass spectrometry. The proton transfer using H₃O⁺ as a reagent ion was used for the detection of nitro-organic compounds such as nitromethane and nitrophenol. The time-resolved measurement of the nitro-organic compounds in the laboratory experiments with a chassis dynamometer system revealed their emission properties, such as the dependence of the emissions as a function of vehicular velocity and acceleration/deceleration, as well as the effect of various types of exhaust gas treatment. The data regarding the nitromethane and nitrophenol emissions obtained in the field measurements were consistent with the results of the laboratory experiments done with a chassis dynamometer system. In the experiments involving evaporative emissions from gasoline-powered cars, NO⁺ was used as a reagent ion. Online measurements showed that the adsorption of hydrocarbons in a sealed housing evaporative determination unit could result in emissions being underestimated, if the concentrations are monitored only before and after a diurnal breathing loss test. The composition analysis gave an estimated ozone formation potential (OFP) approximately 20 % higher for breakthrough emissions and refueling emissions than for the gasoline that was tested, but the OFP for the permeation emissions was almost the same as the OFP for the test fuel.

Reliable assessment of water quality is a critical issue for estuaries. Nutrient concentrations show significant spatial distinctions between areas under the influence of fresh-sea water interaction and anthropogenic effects. For this situation, given the limitations of general mean estimation approaches, a new method for surfaces with non-homogeneity (MSN) was applied to obtain optimized linear unbiased estimations of the mean nutrient concentrations in the study area in the Yangtze estuary from 2011 to 2013. Other mean estimation methods, including block Kriging (BK), simple random sampling (SS) and stratified sampling (ST) inference, were applied simultaneously for comparison. Their performance was evaluated by estimation error. The results show that MSN had the highest accuracy, while SS had the highest estimation error. ST and BK were intermediate in terms of their performance. Thus, MSN is an appropriate method that can be adopted to reduce the uncertainty of mean pollutant estimation in estuaries.

Superhydrophobic metal wire mesh (SMWM) has frequently been applied for the selective and efficient separation of oil/water mixture due to its porous structure and special wettability. However, current methods for the modification of metal wire mesh to be superhydrophobic suffered from problems with respect to complex experimental procedures or time-consuming process. In this study, a very simple, time-saving and single-step electrospray method was proposed to fabricate SMWM and the whole procedure required about only 2min. The morphology, surface composition and wettability of the SMWM were all evaluated, and the oil/water separation ability was further investigated. In addition, a commercial available sponge covered with SMWM was fabricated as an oil adsorbent for the purpose of oil recovery. This study demonstrated a convenient and fast method to modify the metal wire mesh to be superhydrophobic and such simple method might find practical applications in the large-scale removal of oils.

The bacterial diversity in ballast water from five general cargo ships calling at the Port of Houston was determined with ion semiconductor DNA sequencing (Ion Torrent PGM) of PCR amplified 16S rRNA genes. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that the composition of bacteria in ballast water did not resemble that of typical marine habitats or even open ocean waters where BWEs occur. The predominant group of bacteria in ships conducting BWEs was the Roseobacter clade within the Alphaproteobacteria. In contrast, Gammaproteobacteria were predominant in the ship that did not conduct a BWE. All the ships contained human, fish, and terrestrial plant pathogens as well as bacteria indicative of fecal or activated sludge contamination. Most of the 60 pathogens had not been detected in ballast water previously. Among these were the human pathogens Corynebacterium diptheriae and several Legionella species and the fish pathogens Francisella piscicida and Piscirickettsia salmonis.

The growths of oil and gas exploration and production activities have increased environmental problems, such as oil spillage and the resulting pollution. The study of the methods for cleaning up oil spills is a critical issue to protect the environment. Various techniques are available to contain oil spills, but they are typically time consuming, energy inefficient and create secondary pollution. The use of a sorbent, such as a nanofibre sorbent, is a technique for controlling oil spills because of its good physical and oil sorption properties. This review discusses about the application of nanofibre sorbent for oil removal from water and its current developments. With their unique physical and mechanical properties coupled with their very high surface area and small pore sizes, nanofibre sorbents are alternative materials for cleaning up oil spills.

We investigated the factors influencing the origin of Cochlodinium polykrikoides blooms along the Goheung coast (GH), and compared them to those along the Geoje (GJ) coast and in the East China Sea (ECS) which were used as reference sites. Stratification did not develop in GH during C. polykrikoides blooms, unlike that in GJ. The surface salinity during summer in ECS was equivalent to that of GH, whereas surface temperature and concentration of nutrients in ECS were markedly higher than those in GH or GJ. Thermohaline (or thermal) fronts appeared between the Korea Southern Coastal Water (KSCW) and the outer seawater during C. polykrikoides blooms. The result of numerical simulation models indicated that freshwater from the Yangtze River clearly affected KSCW. As a result, the origin of C. polykrikoides blooms in GH during summer could be attributed to the inflow of seawater from ECS with high water temperature and abundant nutrients.

The hydrolyzed protein derived from seafood waste is regarded as a premium and low-cost nitrogen source for microbial growth. In this study, optimization of enzymatic shrimp waste hydrolyzing process was investigated. The degree of hydrolysis (DH) with four processing variables including enzyme/substrate ratio (E/S), hydrolysis time, initial pH value and temperature, were monitored. The DH values were used for response surface methodology (RSM) optimization through central composite design (CCD) and for training artificial neural network (ANN) to make a process prediction. Results indicated that the optimum levels of variables are: E/S ratio at 1.64%, hydrolysis time at 3.59h, initial pH at 9 and temperature at 52.57°C. Hydrocarbon-degrading bacteria Bacillus subtilis N3-1P was cultivated using different DHs of hydrolysate. The associated growth curves were generated. The research output facilitated effective shrimp waste utilization.

The distribution, seasonal variations and ecological risk assessment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in water from three estuaries in Hai River Basin of China, which has been suffering from different anthropogenic pressures, were investigated. In three estuaries, the average concentration of ΣPAHs was the lowest in Luan River estuary, followed by Hai River estuary, and the highest in Zhangweixin River estuary. There were significant seasonal variations in ΣPAHs, the concentrations of ΣPAHs were higher in November than in May and August. The composition profiles of PAHs in different sites were significantly different, and illustrated seasonal variations. Generally, 2-ring (Nap) and 3-ring PAHs (Acp, Fl and Phe) were the most abundant components at most sampling sites in three estuaries. The PAHs in three estuaries were mainly originated from pyrogenic sources. A method based on toxic equivalency factors (TEFs) and risk quotient (RQ) was proposed to assess the ecological risk of ΣPAHs, with the ecological risk of individual PAHs being considered separately. The results showed that the ecological risks caused by ΣPAHs were high in Hai River estuary and Zhangweixin River estuary, and moderate in Luan River estuary. The mean values of ecological risk in August were lower than those in November. The contributions of individual PAHs to ecological risk were different in May, August and November. 3-ring and 4-ring PAHs accounted for much more ecological risk than 2-ring, 5-ring and 6-ring, although the contributions of 5-ring and 6-ring to ecological risk were higher than these to PAHs concentrations.