A simple spectrophotometric method was developed to quantify chlorophenol (CP) concentrations after reaction with potassium permanganate and quenching with sodium sulfite. Other quenching agents (peroxide, sodium thiosulfate and hydroxylamine hydrochloride) were found to create absorbance in the spectral range required for CP quantification. Analysis at pH 12 gave greater absorption and sensitivity for the method compared with pH 5.6. The calibration curves of the proposed methods were linear in the concentration ranges 0.0061–0.61 and 0.0078–0.78 mM with detection limit of 0.0006 and 0.0008 mM for dichlorophenols and monochlorophenols, respectively. The oxidation kinetics of five chlorophenols in aqueous solution with excess potassium permanganate were evaluated using the analytical method. The pseudo-first-order reaction rates were found to be relatively rapid 1.42 × 10−3 to 0.024 s−1 and followed the sequence 2-chlorophenol (2-CP) > 2,6-dichlorophenol (2,6-DCP) > 4-chlorophenol (4-CP) > 2,4-dichlorophenol (2, 4-DCP) > 3-chlorophenol (3-CP). The apparent second-order rate constant was calculated from the measured pseudo-first-order rate constant with respect to CP with initial KMnO4 concentration (1.5 mM) and follows the same sequence of pseudo-first-order rate constant. This shows that chlorine atoms in the structure of chlorophenol had a significant influence on the oxidation of chlorophenols by potassium permanganate. Permanganate can be used for the treatment of chlorophenol-contaminated soil and groundwater.

Currently, there are five known types of mercury transporters in bacteria: MerC, MerE, MerF, MerH, and MerT. Their general function is to mediate mercuric ion uptake into the cell in preparation for reduction to Hg°. They are present in several bacterial phyla and comprise five distinct families. We have utilized standard statistical bioinformatic tools and the superfamily principle to show that they are related by common descent. After using programs such as Global Alignment Program and SSearch to establish homology, we aligned and analyzed their amino acid sequences to find a single well conserved motif. Although these proteins exhibit 2, 3, or 4 transmembrane helical segments (TMSs), TMSs 1 and 2 are common to all superfamily members. An ancestral sequence was determined, and reliable phylogenetic trees were constructed. The results support the conclusion of homology, establishing that these proteins belong to a single superfamily. This important discovery allows extrapolation of information about structure, function, and mechanism from one protein to all superfamily members to degrees inversely proportional to their phylogenetic distances.

The high hydrophobicity of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) is the main limiting factor for the remediation of soils and aquifers. Surfactants are amphiphilic substances which encourage the transfer of hydrophobic compounds from the solid to the liquid phase. While the interaction between organic matter and surfactants has been widely studied, there is a lack of knowledge concerning the relationship between surfactant efficiency and the granulometry of soil and/or geologic material. In this paper, three non-ionic surfactants (Tween 80, Gold Crew, and BS-400) were used to study the desorption of pyrene, chosen as a representative PAH, in soils with different grain size proportions (1%, 5%, 10%, and 20% of clay and silt) and no organic matter (<0.1%). The best quantity of surfactant to apply is closely related to the proportion of fine materials. Tween 80 gave better maximum desorption than Gold Crew and BS-400 (89%, 40%, and 36%, respectively). As an important proportion of aquifers show fine material above 1%, the effective critical micellar concentration obtained when applying surfactants to this type of geologic materials has to be higher than 150 mg L−1 for Tween 80, and higher than 65 mg L−1, and 100 mg L−1 for Golf Crew and BS 400, respectively. Furthermore, results indicate that carrying out simple laboratory tests before the use of surfactants on a field scale is necessary to improve the efficiency and minimize the financial and environmental impact of its application.

In the last few years, a great deal of research on soil has been carried out in order to develop a low-cost remediation method for reducing the environmental risks due to the pollution caused by heavy metals. In the light of this, the zeolitization achieved in soils mixed with coal fly ash could be a useful answer to reduce the amount and the mobility of metals in polluted areas. In this study, a selected soil treated with coal fly ash and artificially contaminated with Zn or Pb was used to synthesize zeolite at low temperature in laboratory and on a bench-scale experiments. Mineralogical data showed that the synthesis of zeolite X took place readily after the first month, and the amount of the newly formed mineral increased during the entire 1-year-long incubation period. The presence of toxic elements does not interfere with zeolite crystallization, whereas the chemical analysis indicated that a reduction in heavy metal availability takes place in the samples characterized by the presence of zeolite.

The number of Enterobacteriaceae, with particular attention given to the presence of Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae, was determined in hospital effluents and municipal wastewater after various stages of purification. The emission of these microorganisms to the ambient air near wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) facilities and to the river water, which is a receiver of the WWTP effluent, was also studied using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) and cultivation methods. The number of Enterobacteriaceae determined by cultivation and fluorescence methods in different kinds of sewage sample ranged from 0.5 × 10³ to 2.9 × 10⁶ CFU/ml and from 2.2 × 10⁵ to 1.3 × 10⁸ cells/ml, respectively. Their removal rates during treatment processes were close to 99 %, but the number of these bacteria in the WWTP outflow was quite high and ranged from 5.9 × 10³ to 3.5 × 10⁴ CFU/ml and from 1.1 × 10⁵ to 6.1 × 10⁵ cells/ml, respectively. In the river water and the air samples, the number of Enterobacteriaceae was also high and ranged from 4.1 × 10³ to 7.9 × 10³ CFU/ml and from 3 to 458 CFU/m³, respectively. The numbers of these microorganisms obtained from fluorescence and cultivation methods were statistically and significantly correlated; however, the analysis of the studied samples indicated that the FISH method gave values up to 10³-fold times greater than those obtained by the cultivation method. From a sanitary point of view, this means that the number of viable fecal bacteria is systematically underestimated by traditional culture-based methods. Thus, the FISH proves to be a method that could be used to estimate bacterial load, particularly in air samples and less contaminated river water.

Knowledge concerning the main flows of priority substances (PSs) and the production systems and consumption structures in the society causing these flows is a prerequisite for any attempt to predict and understand their environmental fate as well as to efficiently minimize future environmental burdens. In this paper, a simple SFA diagram on mercury, including the main European Union (EU-27) source categories, flows and environmental endpoints which in turn affect the mercury concentrations in the EU-27 waters are illustrated. From trend analysis and future projections, it becomes obvious that emissions of mercury as a trace contaminant in fuels and minerals (primary anthropogenic emission sources) are becoming increasingly important to the environmental concentrations compared to emissions from mercury used intentionally (secondary anthropogenic sources). Additional future control strategies should therefore be targeted industrial sources and safe treatment of mercury-containing wastes, wastewater effluents, as well as residues collected from various combustion processes. It was found that knowledge on flows and emission sources on a large geographical scale is limited due to a lack of information on emission factors from various industrial processes and waste systems, especially for the mercury being discharges to water and land.

In this work, the electrochemical treatment of an effluent from the pharmaceutical industry with boron-doped diamond electrodes was investigated. The electrolyses were carried out in a discontinuous operation mode under galvanostatic conditions, using a bench-scale plant equipped with a single-compartment electrochemical flow cell. The effect of operating conditions, such as current density (from 25.7 to 179.4 mA cm2) and flow rate (from 104.8 to 564.7 cm3 min−1), at residence times between 0 and 570 min, was studied. Design of experiments was used for optimizing the process. The global contribution of operative parameters and evolution of the residence time in TOC removal was studied, and a time of 77 min was obtained in order to evaluate the highest influence of the operative parameters. For this time, ANOVA test reported significance for four of the five involved variables. The current density was found to have a considerable positive effect on TOC removal, whereas the flow rate was found to have a moderate negative effect on target variable.

Total gaseous mercury (TGM) fluxes from the forest floor and a boreal wetland were measured by a flux chamber technique coupled with an automatic mercury vapour analyser. The fluxes were measured at three sampling sites in southern Finland, 61°14′ N, 25°04′ E in summer 2007, with additionally in situ TGM concentrations in the air at one of the sites and mercury bulk deposition at another. Most of the flux data were collected during the daytime. At one of the sites, diurnal flux behaviour was studied, and a clear cycle with an afternoon maximum and a night minimum was observed. The highest emissions (up to 3.5 ng m−2 h−1) were observed at the forest floor site having a moss and grass cover. At the wetland and litter-rich forest floor sites, the emissions were below 1 ng m−2 h−1 and sometimes negative (down to −1.0 ng m−2 h−1), indicating mercury uptake. The measured average fluxes in August were 0.9 ± 1.1 and 0.2 ± 0.3 ng m−2 h−1 for the forest floor sites and wetland sites, respectively. The flux data were compared with the mercury bulk deposition, which proved to be of the same magnitude, but opposite in sign. At the mossy forest floor site, the extrapolated TGM emissions were 130% of the Hg deposition in August 2007. Comparison with other studies showed that the fluxes in background areas are relatively uniform, regardless of measurement site location and method used. Airborne TGM remained at the background level during the study, with an average value of 1.3 ± 0.2 ng m−3; it frequently showed a diurnal cycle pattern.

Redox stratification, especially hypolimnetic anoxia resulting from eutrophication, and salinization resulting from application of salts for road deicing is investigated in three kettle lakes in southwest Michigan. Two of the lakes (Asylum and Woods Lakes) are located in urban Kalamazoo, Michigan, and the third (Brewster Lake) is located in rural Hastings, Michigan. In summer, the water columns of all three lakes are distinctly redox stratified, with anoxic hypolimnia and significant accumulation of reduced solutes (e.g., Mn(II), Fe(II), ammonia) in the lake bottom waters. Extremely elevated conductivity, chloride, sodium, and potassium levels are observed in the urban Asylum and Woods Lakes compared to the rural Brewster Lake, presumably due to runoff of road salt deicers applied in the surrounding watershed. These significant changes in water quality are of concern because they may detrimentally impact lake mixing, biodiversity, and ecosystem function in the urban lakes.

This study concentrated on the direct immobilization of anatase nano titanium dioxide particles (TiO₂, 44 nm particle size) into or onto a biodegradable polymer, polycaprolactone, by solvent-cast processes. The photocatalytic properties of the produced materials were tested by photocatalytic removal of organic contaminant 4-chlorophenol. Produced TiO₂ immobilized polymer successfully removed 4-chlorophenol (4-CP, 20 ppm which is equal to 1.56 × 10⁻⁴ M) from aqueous solution without additional pH arrangement employing a UV-A light (365 nm) source. Immobilization of n-TiO₂ onto polycaprolactone (PCL) produced improved 4-CP removal percentages, reaching to nearly 85 %. Increased PCL mass significantly increases the removal percentage of 4-CP. When a UVC lamp emitting 254 nm light is used, the removal percentage reaches to 89 %. UV irradiation did not cause any change in the microstructure of the polymeric material (confirmed with ATR-FTIR analysis). This is an important evidence that the material could be reused for further photocatalytic treatments. Produced material seems to be highly promising for successful removal of organic pollutants beside its biodegradable nature.