Plastic production pellets collected from beaches of south west England contain variable concentrations of trace metals (Cr, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, Cd and Pb) that, in some cases, exceed concentrations reported for local estuarine sediments. The rates and mechanisms by which metals associate with virgin and beached polyethylene pellets were studied by adding a cocktail of 5 μg L⁻¹ of trace metals to 10 g L⁻¹ pellet suspensions in filtered seawater. Kinetic profiles were modelled using a pseudo-first-order equation and yielded response times of less than about 100 h and equilibrium partition coefficients of up to about 225 ml g⁻¹ that were consistently higher for beached pellets than virgin pellets. Adsorption isotherms conformed to both the Langmuir and Freundlich equations and adsorption capacities were greater for beached pellets than for virgin pellets. Results suggest that plastics may represent an important vehicle for the transport of metals in the marine environment.

Sorption of perfluorinated compounds (PFCs) on carbon nanotubes (CNTs) is critical for understanding their subsequent transport and fate in aqueous environments, but the sorption mechanisms remain largely unknown. In this study, the sorption of six PFCs on CNTs increased with increasing C-F chain length when they had a same functional group, and the CNTs with hydroxyl and carboxyl groups had much lower adsorbed amount than the pristine CNTs, indicating that hydrophobic interaction dominated the sorption of PFCs on the CNTs. Electrostatic repulsion suppressed the sorption of PFCs on the CNTs, resulting in the lower sorption with increasing pH. Hydrogen bonding interaction was negligible. The hydrophobic C-F chains can be closely adsorbed on the CNTs surface in parallel to the axis or along the curvature, making it impossible to form micelles on the CNT surface, leading to the lower sorption than other adsorbents.

The environmental behavior of antibiotics is not well known and the precise environmental risk assessment is not practical. This study investigated the sorption kinetics of ofloxacin, a widely used antibiotics, on soil particles with different organic carbon contents as well as soil components (a humic acid, ferric oxide and kaolinite). Two-compartment sorption kinetics were mathematically recognized (except ferric oxide because of its very fast sorption). The apparent sorption rate and the contribution of fast sorption compartment decreased with the increased organic carbon content with the exception of humic acid, suggesting that the slow sorption sites were partially located in organo-mineral complex. The OFL concentration-dependent sorption kinetics suggested that the slow sorption compartment was not controlled by diffusion process as indicated by slower sorption at higher OFL loading. The difference between OFL sorption kinetics and those of hydrophobic organic contaminants was discussed and possible mechanism of OFL two-compartment sorption was proposed.

Organic complexing agents, such as ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), nitrilotriacetic acid (NTA) and picolinic acid, have been widely used at nuclear sites and are therefore found as common co-contaminants in radioactive contaminated land. This study has explored the mechanisms by which these three complexing agents affect the sorption of Th(IV) to pure silica and a natural sand. EDTA, NTA and, to a lesser extent, picolinic acid decreased the sorption of Th to silica, demonstrating the formation and solubility of Th complexes. However, Th sorption to sand was kinetically controlled and complexation enhanced the rate of Th sorption. EDTA and NTA did not sorb significantly to the sand, and metal desorption indicated that the mechanism involved exchange with sand-associated metals. At equilibrium, however, Th sorption was not affected by the presence of the ligands, and modelling suggested that the interaction between Th and the surface binding sites controlled Th sorption thermodynamically.

The sorption and biodegradation of pyrene by Klebsiella oxytoca PYR-1 (PYR-1) in the presence of nonionic surfactant Tween 80 were investigated toward a better understanding that how surfactants can affect biodegradation of hydrophobic organic compounds. The results indicated that Tween 80 can promote the removal, sorption and biodegradation of pyrene depending on the surfactant concentration, of which the most significant promotion of biodegradation was achieved at critical micelle concentration of Tween 80 with an improvement of 22.4%. A highly positive correlation (P<0.0001) was observed between the biodegradation and sorption of pyrene with the presence of Tween 80. Biosorption experiments showed the same trends as biodegradation and further illustrated the improved biodegradation of pyrene was mainly due to surfactant-facilitated sorption. The regularly changes of cell surface hydrophobicity suggested formation of more hydrophobic surface caused by surfactant sorption lead to stimulation of pyrene sorption.

Adsorption of mercury (Hg) on lignin was studied at a range of pH values using a combination of batch adsorption experiments, a surface complexation model (SCM) and synchrotron X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS). Surface complexation modeling indicates that three types of acid sites on lignin surfaces, namely aliphatic carboxylic-, aromatic carboxylic- and phenolic-type surface groups, contributed to Hg(II) adsorption. The bond distance and coordination number of Hg(II) adsorption samples at pH 3.0, 4.0 and 5.5 were obtained from extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) spectroscopy analysis. The results of SCM and XAS combined reveal that the predominant adsorption species of Hg(II) on lignin changes from HgCl₂ ⁰ to monodentate complex –C–O–HgCl and then bidentate complex –C–O–Hg–O–C– with increasing pH value from 2.0 to 6.0. The good agreement between SCM and XAS results provides new insight into understanding the mechanisms of Hg(II) adsorption on lignin.

Short chain chlorinated paraffins (SCCPs) are semi-volatile chemicals that are considered persistent in the environment, potential toxic and subject to long-range transport. This study investigates the concentrations and gas-particle partitioning of SCCPs at an urban site in Beijing during summer and wintertime. The total atmospheric SCCP levels ranged 1.9–33.0 ng/m³ during wintertime. Significantly higher levels were found during the summer (range 112–332 ng/m³). The average fraction of total SCCPs in the particle phase (ϕ) was 0.67 during wintertime but decreased significantly during the summer (ϕ = 0.06). The ten and eleven carbon chain homologues with five to eight chlorine atoms were the predominant SCCP formula groups in air. Significant linear correlations were found between the gas-particle partition coefficients and the predicted subcooled vapor pressures and octanol–air partition coefficients. The gas-particle partitioning of SCCPs was further investigated and compared with both the Junge–Pankow adsorption and Kₒₐ-based absorption models.

Complementary sorption of different chemicals was expected and investigating the relationship between the sorption inhibition of primary sorbate (ΔQᵖʳⁱ) and sorption of secondary sorbate (Qˢᵉᶜ) could provide a new angle to understand coadsorption of different chemicals. This study used bisphenol A (BPA) as the primary adsorbate, sulfamethoxazole (SMX) as the competitor, and carbon nanotubes as model adsorbents to study their complementary and competitive adsorption. At low BPA concentrations, the sorption of SMX (Qˢᵉᶜ) exceeded BPA sorption inhibition (ΔQᵖʳⁱ), indicating that these two chemicals complementarily adsorbed on their respectively preferred sorption sites. At high BPA concentrations, higher ΔQᵖʳⁱ was observed in comparison to Qˢᵉᶜ, which may be resulted from different packing efficiencies of the adsorbed SMX and BPA. This study emphasized that both competitive and complementary sorption should be discussed in binary sorption system.

Solid humic acid (HA) particles were dissolved and subsequently coated on a type of multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs). Pb²⁺ sorption from water by the solid HA, the MWCNTs and the obtained HA-MWCNT complexes was compared. The underlying mechanism of the difference in the sorption was discussed with the data at different pHs, results of desorption in the presence and absence of Ca²⁺ and the characterizations using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry, X-ray energy dispersion spectroscopy and X-ray absorption fine structure spectroscopy. The effect of MWCNT-contained impurities on the sorption was also examined. It was shown that the surface-bound HA introduced oxygen-containing functional groups and negative charges on the MWCNTs, thus greatly increasing Pb²⁺ sorption on the MWCNTs. Pb²⁺ could be electrostatically attracted into outer-sphere of the electric double layer of the HA-MWCNT complexes, a fraction of which would form coordination complexes with carboxyl groups in the inner- and/or outer-sphere.

Desorption kinetic and isothermal characteristics of BDE-28 and BDE-47 were investigated using natural soils with different organic carbon fractions. The results indicated that a two-compartment first-order model with dominant contribution of slow desorption could adequately describe the released kinetics of studied PBDEs. Desorption isotherms of different samples could be fitted well by linear distribution model or nonlinear Freundlich model. Moreover, most desorption procedures roughly exhibited hysteresis with respect to preceding sorption ones. At the statistically significant level of 0.05 or 0.1, total organic carbon content (fOC) exhibited significant correlations with the fitted parameters by the isothermal models. The correlations of fOC and SOM fractions (e.g., fulvic acid and humin) with the single point desorption coefficients at lower aqueous concentrations of studied PBDEs were significant; while at higher aqueous concentrations, the relationships were less significant or insignificant. Our findings may facilitate a comprehensive understanding on behaviors of PBDEs in soil systems.