Traffic has long been recognized as the major contributor to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) emissions to the urban atmosphere. Stationary combustion sources, including residential space heating systems, are also a major contributor to PAH emissions. The aim of this study was to determine the profile and concentration of PAHs in stack flue gas emissions from different kinds of space heaters in order to increase the understanding of the scale of the PAH pollution problem caused by this source. This study set out to first assess the characteristics of PAHs and their corresponding benzo[a]pyrene equivalent emissions from a few types of domestic heaters and central heating systems to the urban atmosphere. The study, enabled for the first time, the characterization of PAHs in stationary combustion sources in the city of Damascus, Syria. Nine different types of heating systems were selected with respect to age, design, and type of fuel burned. The concentrations of 15 individual PAH compounds in the stack flue gas were determined in the extracts of the collected samples using high-performance liquid chromatography system (HPLC) equipped with ultraviolet–visible and fluorescence detectors. In general, older domestic wood stoves caused considerably higher PAH emissions than modern domestic heaters burning diesel oil. The average concentration of ΣPAH (sum of 15 compounds) in emissions from all types of studied heating systems ranged between 43 ± 0.4 and 316 ± 1.4 μg/m³. Values of total benzo[a]pyrene equivalent ranged between 0.61 and 15.41 μg/m³.

The objective of the study is to examine the long-run and causal relationship between climate change (i.e., greenhouse gas emissions, hydrofluorocarbons, per fluorocarbons, and sulfur hexafluoride), air pollution (i.e., methane emissions, nitrous oxide emissions, and carbon dioxide emissions), and tourism development indicators (i.e., international tourism receipts, international tourism expenditures, natural resource depletion, and net forest depletion) in the World’s largest regions. The aggregate data is used for robust analysis in the South Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, and East Asia and the Pacific regions, over a period of 1975–2012. The results show that climatic factors and air pollution have a negative impact on tourism indicators in the form of deforestation and natural resource depletion. The impact is evident, as we have seen the systematic eroding of tourism industry, due to severe changes in climate and increasing strain of air pollution. There are several channels of cause–effect relationship between the climatic factors, air pollution, and tourism indicators in the World’s region. The study confirms the unidirectional, bidirectional, and causality independent relationship between climatic factors, air pollution, and tourism indicators in the World. It is conclusive that tourism industry is facing all time bigger challenges of reduce investment, less resources, and minor importance from the government agencies because of the two broad challenges, i.e., climate change and air pollution, putting them in a dismal state.

The sulfur–limestone autotrophic denitrification (SLAD) biofilter was able to remove phosphorous from wastewater during autotrophic denitrification. Parameters influencing autotrophic denitrification in the SLAD biofilter, such as hydraulic retention time (HRT), influent nitrate (NO₃⁻), and influent PO₄³⁻concentrations, had significant effects on P removal. P removal was well correlated with total oxidized nitrogen (TON) removed in the SLAD biofilter; the more TON removed, the more efficient P removal was achieved. When treating the synthetic wastewater containing NO₃⁻-N of 30 mg L⁻¹and PO₄³⁻-P of 15 mg L⁻¹, the SLAD biofilter removed phosphorus of 45 % when the HRT was 6 h, in addition with TN removal of nearly 100 %. The optimal phosphorus removal in the SLAD biofilter was around 60 %. For the synthetic wastewater containing a PO₄³⁻-P concentration of 15 mg L⁻¹, the main mechanism of phosphorus removal was the formation of calcium phosphate precipitates.

Previous researches have demonstrated that biological phosphorus removal (BPR) from wastewater could be driven by the aerobic/extended-idle (A/EI) regime. This study further investigated temperature effects on phosphorus removal performance in six A/EI sequencing batch reactors (SBRs) operated at temperatures ranging from 5 to 30 °C. The results showed that phosphorus removal efficiency increased with temperature increasing from 5 to 20 °C but slightly decreased when temperature continually increased to 30 °C. The highest phosphorus removal rate of 97.1 % was obtained at 20 °C. The biomass cultured at 20 °C contained more polyphosphate accumulating organisms (PAO) and less glycogen accumulating organisms (GAO) than that cultured at any other temperatures investigated. The mechanism studies revealed that temperature affected the transformations of glycogen and polyhydroxyalkanoates, and the activities of exopolyphosphatase and polyphosphate kinase activities. In addition, phosphorus removal performances of the A/EI and traditional anaerobic/oxic (A/O) SBRs were compared at 5 and 20 °C, respectively. The results showed the A/EI regime drove better phosphorus removal than the A/O regime at both 5 and 20 °C, and more PAO and less GAO abundances in the biomass might be the principal reason for the higher BPR in the A/EI SBRs as compared with the A/O SBRs.

To investigate the response of the tributyltin-degrading fungal strain Cunninghamella elegans to the organotin, a comparative lipidomics strategy was employed using an LC/MS-MS technique. A total of 49 lipid species were identified. Individual phospholipids were then quantified using a multiple reaction monitoring method. Tributyltin (TBT) caused a decline in the amounts of many molecular species of phosphatidylethanolamine or phosphatidylserine and an increase in the levels of phosphatidic acid, phosphatidylinositol and phosphatidylcholine. In the presence of TBT, it was observed that overall unsaturation was lower than in the control. Lipidome data were analyzed using principal component analysis, which confirmed the compositional changes in membrane lipids in response to TBT. Additionally, treatment of fungal biomass with butyltin led to a significant increase in lipid peroxidation. It is suggested that modification of the phospholipids profile and lipids peroxidation may reflect damage to mycelium caused by TBT.

Optimizing process parameters that affect the remediation time and power consumption can improve the treatment efficiency of the electrokinetic remediation as well as determine the cost of a remediation action. Lab-scale electrokinetic remediation of Pb-contaminated soils was investigated for the effect of complexant ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) and acetic acid and approaching anode on the removal efficiency of Pb. When EDTA was added to the catholyte, EDTA dissolved insoluble Pb in soils to form soluble Pb–EDTA complexes, increasing Pb mobility and accordingly removal efficiency. The removal efficiency was enhanced from 47.8 to 61.5 % when the EDTA concentration was increased from 0.1 to 0.2 M, showing that EDTA played an important role in remediation. And the migration rate of Pb was increased to 72.3 % when both EDTA and acetic acid were used in the catholyte. The “approaching anode electrokinetic remediation” process in the presence of both EDTA and acetic acid had a higher Pb-removal efficiency with an average efficiency of 83.8 %. The efficiency of electrokinetic remediation was closely related to Pb speciation. Exchangeable and carbonate-bounded Pb were likely the forms which could be removed. All results indicate that the approaching anode method in the presence of EDTA and acetic acid is an advisable choice for electrokinetic remediation of Pb-contaminated soil.

To test the feasibility of the reuse of iron-rich sludge (IRS) produced from a coal mine drainage treatment plant for removing As(III) and As(V) from aqueous solutions, we investigated various parameters, such as contact time, pH, initial As concentration, and competing ions, based on the IRS characterization. The IRS consisted of goethite and calcite, and had large surface area and small particles. According to energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy mapping results, As was mainly removed by adsorption onto iron oxides. The adsorption kinetic studies showed that nearly 70 % adsorption of As was achieved within 1 h, and the pseudo-second-order model well explained As sorption on the IRS. The adsorption isotherm results agreed with the Freundlich isotherm model, and the maximum adsorption capacities for As(III) and As(V) were 66.9 and 21.5 mg/g, respectively, at 293 K. In addition, the adsorption showed the endothermic character. At high pH or in the presence of phosphate, the adsorption of As was decreased. When the desorption experiment was conducted to reuse the IRS, 85 % As was desorbed with 1.0 N NaOH. In the column experiment, adsorbed As in real acid mine drainage was 43 % of the maximum adsorbed amount of As in the batch test. These results suggested that the IRS is an effective adsorbent for As and can be effectively applied for the removal of As in water and wastewater.

Dimethylformamide (DMF) is a broad solvent used in the production of synthetic leather. Decades of year's research have been focused on workers in leather factories suffering from the release of DMF. However, little attention was paid on general population. Here, we examined the relationship between consistent DMF exposure and annual hospitalizations of local residents in Longwan, China, in 2008. We found a positive correlation with a relative risk (RR) increase of 1.110 for total hospitalizations. When the data were stratified by sex, we observed a higher correlation for female hospitalizations than for male hospitalizations, with RR values of 1.55 and 1.084, respectively. This might be attributed to the differences in genotypes of oxidant enzyme between gender. The significance of the correlations did not disappear after we excluded the extreme value of DMF or adjusted for SO₂, NO₂, and PM₁₀. Population living near the leather factory has experienced almost constant DMF exposure, and real concern should be raised regarding such exposure. Governments should take responsibility for the protection of not only occupational workers but also residents, especially women.

Prenatal exposure to trace metals, whether they are essential, non-essential, or toxic, must be assessed for their potential health effects in the offspring. Herein is reported an approach to this end which involved collection of urine samples during the first and third trimesters of pregnancy from 489 mothers from Sabadell (Catalonia, Spain), a highly industrialized town. These samples were analyzed for cobalt (Co), nickel (Ni), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), selenium (Se), arsenic (As), molybdenum (Mo), cadmium (Cd), antimonium (Sb), cesium (Cs), thallium (Tl), and lead (Pb). An acid digestion method was developed and validated for inductively coupled plasma quadruple mass spectrometry (Q-ICP-MS) analysis of these 12 metals. The median concentrations of metals ranged from 0.13 to 290 μg/g creatinine, the highest levels were found for Zn and the lowest for Th. The mean concentrations of most metals except As, Ni, Th, and Pb showed statistically significant differences between both trimesters. The concentrations of Mo, Se, Cd, Cs, and Sb were higher in the first than in the third trimester, whereas the opposite was found for Co, Cu, and Zn. The concentrations of all metals in both sampling periods showed statistically significant correlations (p < 0.01 for Mo and Cu, p < 0.001 for the others). The significant correlations of metal urine concentrations in the first and third trimesters of pregnancy suggest that the observed differences between both periods are related to physiological changes. Accordingly, the measured urine concentrations during either the first or third trimesters can be used as estimates of exposure during pregnancy and can serve as markers for prenatal intake of these metals in the studied cohort.

The accumulation of heavy metals in farmland has become an important issue related to food security and environmental risk. The annual inputs of heavy metals (As, Cd, Hg, Pb, Cr, Cu, and Zn) to agricultural soil for a full year in Hainan Island have been studied. Three fluxes through the cultivated horizon were considered: (1) atmospheric depositions, (2) fertilization, and (3) irrigation water. The corresponding samples were collected and analyzed on a large regional scale. The total input fluxes show obvious spatial variability among different regions. The inventory of heavy metal inputs to agricultural land demonstrates that agricultural soil is potentially at risk of heavy metal accumulation from irrigation water. The potential at risk of heavy metal accumulation from atmospheric deposition and fertilizer is relatively low compared to irrigation. The results indicate that Hg is the element of prior concern for agricultural soil, followed by Cd and As, and other heavy metal elements represent little threat to the environment in the study area. This work provides baseline information to develop policies to control and reduce toxic elements accumulated in agricultural soil.