Determination of antibiotics and other veterinary drugs in the solid phase of pig manure

Environmental contamination by veterinary medicinal products and their implications in the conservation of the endangered Pyrenean Capercaillie (Tetrao urogallus aquitanicus)

The endangered Pyrenean Capercaillie (Tetrao urogallus aquitanicus) inhabits perennial forests of the Pyrenees (Spain, France and Andorre). Feces of domestic animals (e.g., horses and cattle) are often found in this species' habitat as evidence of land use overlapping, especially during spring and summer. As a result, pharmaceutical residues found in feces of these domestic ungulates may be absorbed by plants and insects that are part of the diet of Pyrenean Capercaillies (e.g., blueberries [Vaccinium uliginosum, Vaccinium myrtillus], red wood ants [Formica rufa]). Based on the absence of data regarding the exposure of Pyrenean Capercaillie to residues of veterinary medicinal products (VMP), we selected 71 compounds as indicators of anthropogenically-related environmental contamination, analyzed in 90 samples collected in several subalpine forests, northwestern Spain. Residues of several VMP were detected in feces (capercaillie [ciprofloxacin, enrofloxacin, tetracycline and florfenicol], horse [ciprofloxacin, enrofloxacin, tetracycline and ivermectin], and cattle [ciprofloxacin and enrofloxacin]), and in entomofauna (ciprofloxacin and ivermectin). No VMP residues were detected in blueberry plants. Herein, we present novel data about the presence of VMP residues in the Pyrenean Capercaillie's environment, and identify potential VMP sources (i.e., livestock feces and entomofauna) and an exposure route (i.e., food chain) for Capercaillie chicks. Further studies are necessary to investigate the potential indirect or chronic effects of VMP residues in the species' breeding success and adult fitness, which must be taken into account by managers and policy makers to improve management and conservation actions.

Multiomics analysis of the effects of manure-borne doxycycline combined with oversized fiber microplastics on pak choi growth and the risk of antibiotic resistance gene transmission

In this study, oversized microplastics (OMPs) were intentionally introduced into soil containing manure-borne doxycycline (DOX). This strategic approach was used to systematically examine the effects of combined OMP and DOX pollution on the growth of pak choi, analyze alterations in soil environmental metabolites, and explore the potential migration of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs). The results revealed a more pronounced impact of DOX than of OMPs. Slender-fiber OMPs (SF OMPs) had a more substantial influence on the growth of pak choi than did coarse-fiber OMPs (CF OMPs). Conversely, CF OMPs had a more significant effect on the migration of ARGs within the system. When DOX was combined with OMPs, the negative effects of DOX on pak choi growth were mitigated through the synthesis of indole through the adjustment of carbon metabolism and amino acid metabolism in pak choi roots. In this process, Pseudohongiellaceae and Xanthomonadaceae were key bacteria. During the migration of ARGs, the potential host bacterium Limnobacter should be considered. Additionally, the majority of potential host bacteria in the pak choi endophytic environment were associated with tetG. This study provides insights into the intricate interplay among DOX, OMPs, ARGs, plant growth, soil metabolism, and the microbiome.

Assessing antibiotic residues in sediments from mangrove ecosystems: A review

Antibiotics' widespread and abusive use in aquaculture and livestock leads to extensive environmental dissemination and dispersion, consequently increasing antibiotic-resistant bacteria in marine ecosystems. Hence, there is an increased need for efficient methods for identifying and quantifying antibiotic residues in soils and sediments. From a review of the last 20 years, we propose and compare different chromatographic techniques for detecting and quantifying antibiotics in sediment samples from marine ecosystems, particularly in mangrove forest sediments. The methods typically include three stages: extraction of antibiotics from the solid matrix, cleaning, and concentration of samples before quantification. We address the leading causes of the occurrence of antibiotics in marine ecosystem sediments and analyze the most appropriate methods for each analytical stage. Ultimately, selecting a method for identifying antibiotic residues depends on multiple factors, ranging from the nature and physicochemical properties of the analytes to the availability of the necessary equipment and the available resources.

Impact of Soil Fertilization with Pig Slurry on Antibiotic Residues and Resistance Genes: A Longitudinal Study

The impact of soil fertilization with animal manure on the spread and persistence of antibiotic resistance in the environment is far from being fully understood. To add knowledge about persistence and correlations between antibiotic residues and antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) in fertilized soil, a longitudinal soil mesocosm study was conducted. Soil samples were collected from the mesocosms immediately before spreading and then afterward at fifteen time points during a 320-day observation period. Eight ARGs (ermB, sul1, tetA, tetG, tetM, cfr, fexA, and optrA) and the class 1 integron-integrase gene, intI1, were determined in both pig slurry and soil, as well as residues of 36 antibiotics. Soil chemical and biochemical parameters were also measured. Twelve antibiotics were detected in the slurry in the range of 3 µg kg-1-3605 µg kg-1, with doxycycline, lincomycin, and tiamulin being the most abundant, whereas ermB, sul1, and tetM were the predominant ARGs. Before spreading, neither antibiotic residues nor ARGs were detectable in the soil; afterwards, their concentrations mirrored those in the slurry, with a gradual decline over the duration of the experiment. After about three months, the effect of the amendment was almost over, and no further evolution was observed.

The Identification and Quantification of 21 Antibacterial Substances by LC-MS/MS in Natural and Organic Liquid Fertilizer Samples

Antibiotics in animal production are widely used around the world for therapeutic and preventive purposes, and in some countries, they still serve as antibiotic growth stimulants. Regardless of the purpose of using antibiotics in livestock, they may be present in animal tissues and organs as well as in body fluids and excretions (feces and urine). Farm animal excrement in unprocessed form (natural fertilizers) or processed form (organic fertilizers) is applied to agricultural fields because it improves soil fertility. Antibiotics present in fertilizers may therefore contaminate the soil, surface, groundwater, and plants, which may pose a threat to the environment, animals, and humans. Therefore, it is important to develop analytical methods that will allow for the control of the presence of antibacterial substances in natural and organic fertilizers. Therefore, in this study, an LC-MS/MS method was developed and validated for the determination of 21 antibacterial substances in natural and organic liquid fertilizers. The developed method was used to analyze 62 samples of natural and organic liquid fertilizers, showing that over 24% of the tested samples were contaminated with antibiotics, mainly from the group of tetracyclines and fluoroquinolones. Studies of post-fermentation sludge from biogas plants have shown that the processes of anaerobic methane fermentation, pH, and temperature changes taking place in bioreactors do not lead to the complete degradation of antibiotics present in the material used for biogas production. For this reason, monitoring studies of natural and organic fertilizers should be undertaken to limit the introduction of antibiotics into the natural environment.

Residues of veterinary antibiotics in manures from pig and chicken farms in a context of antimicrobial use reduction by implementation of health and welfare plans

The use of antibiotics in food-producing animals can induce the presence of residual substances in manure, which are then released into the environment and may contribute to soil and groundwater contamination. During the on-farm implementation of strategies to improve animal health and welfare in chicken and pig farms, the consequences of antibiotic use were evaluated in terms of the occurrence and levels of antibiotic residues in manure. A set of 35 broiler farms from Cyprus, Greece, the Netherlands and 40 pig farms from France and Italy provided a total of 350 manure samples. The primary objective was to develop a specific LC/MS/MS method capable of quantifying antibiotic residues in both types of manure. The method was able to detect fifteen antibiotics belonging to nine classes, with validated limits of quantification of 10-20 μg/kg, and accuracies ranging from 81% to 138%. With the exception of amoxicillin, which was never detected in any manure, all antibiotics used were detected in manure from treated animals with typical concentrations ranging from 10 to 99198 μg/kg for both chickens and pigs. The occurrence of residual antibiotics was higher in chicken than in pig manure, especially for fluoroquinolones and doxycycline which were detected in 89% and 100% of the chicken manure, respectively, and in 28% of the pig manure. The impact of the health plans on the antibiotic load manure was assessed by measuring for each farm the ratio of the sum of all antibiotic concentrations measured after and before the implementation of the plan. The results showed that, in addition to the frequency of treatments, the class of antibiotic used is an important factor to consider as it strongly influences the stability/instability of the compounds, i.e. their ability to persist in the manure of food-producing animals.

Simultaneous detection of pesticides and pharmaceuticals in three types of bio-based fertilizers by an improved QuEChERS method coupled with UHPLC-q-ToF-MS/MS

Bio-based fertilizers (BBFs) have the potential to contain both pesticides and pharmaceutical residues, which may pose a threat to soils, crops, and human health. However, no analytical screening method is available currently to simultaneously analyze a wide range of contaminants in the complex origin-dependent matrices of BBFs. To fill this gap, our study tested and improved an original QuEChERS method (OQM) for simultaneously analyzing 78 pesticides and 18 pharmaceuticals in BBFs of animal, plant, and ashed sewage sludge origin. In spiked recovery experiments, 34-58 pharmaceuticals and pesticides were well recovered (recovery of 70-120%) via OQM at spiking concentrations levels of 10 ng/g and 50 ng/g in these three different types of BBFs. To improve the extraction efficiency further, ultrasonication and end-over-end rotation were added based on OQM, resulting in the improved QuEChERS method (IQM) that could recover 57-79 pesticides and pharmaceuticals, in the range of 70-120%. The detection limits of this method were of 0.16-4.32/0.48-12.97 ng/g, 0.03-11.02/0.10-33.06 ng/g, and 0.06-5.18/0.18-15.54 ng/g for animal, plant, and ash-based BBF, respectively. Finally, the IQM was employed to screen 15 BBF samples of various origins. 15 BBFs contained at least one pesticide or pharmaceutical with ibuprofen being frequently detected in at concentration levels of 4.1-181 ng/g. No compounds were detected in ash-based BBFs.

Identification and Quantification of 29 Active Substances by HPLC-ESI-MS/MS in Lyophilized Swine Manure Samples

Veterinary drugs are frequently employed to treat and prevent diseases in food-producing animals to improve animal health and to avoid the introduction of microorganisms into the food chain. The analysis of the presence of pharmaceutical residues in animal manure could help to evaluate the legal and illegal practices during food production without harming the animals and to correctly manage manure when it is going to be applied as a fertilizer. This article describes a method for the simultaneous analysis of 29 active substances, mostly antibiotics and antiparasitic agents. Substances were extracted from lyophilized manure with a methanol:McIlvaine solution and analyzed with HPLC-ESI-MS/MS and a C18 HPLC column. The method was validated following European guidelines, the achieved trueness was between 63 and 128% (depending on the analytes), and the linearity was between 100 and 1500 µg/kg. The applicability of the method was demonstrated in 40 manure samples collected from pig farms where tetracycline was quantified in 7.5% of the samples. These results show the viability of this non-invasive method for the control of the legal and illegal administration of pharmaceuticals in food-producing animals.

Determination of contaminants of emerging concern in raw pig manure as a whole: difference with the analysis of solid and liquid phases separately

The content of veterinary drugs in manure is usually estimated by the amount of residues determined in its solid or liquid phase, individually, which previously required a separation step. As an alternative, a multiresidue method for the analysis of 48 veterinary drugs and other contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) in swine raw manure as a whole has been developed and in-house validated in this work. The impact of several experimental factors during ultrasound assisted extraction was assessed. Hence, the use of alumina seemed to especially decrease the matrix effect and improve the overall recovery of drugs, mainly those with a high octanol-water partition coefficient. CECs in the extracts were analyzed by ultra-high performance liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry in tandem. A standard addition-matrix matched calibration was used for quantification. Application of the method to two related samples (raw manure and farm centrifuged raw manure) from a facility revealed that the concentrations of CECs determined in the raw manure by the comprehensive methodology were higher than those calculated by adding the concentrations measured in the solid and liquid phases, separately. This was attributed to the loss of CECs adsorbed on fine particles in the suspension during the sample preparation procedure of the liquid-phase. Furthermore, the decrease of residues in the raw manure when this is centrifuged in the farm to yield compost is shown.

Sample pretreatment and analytical methodology for the determination of antibiotics in swine wastewater and activated sludge

An analytical method for the simultaneous extraction and determination of eight veterinary antibiotics in swine wastewater and activated sludge was developed and validated based on the instrumental determination by liquid chromatography tandem quadrupole mass spectrometry. Ultrasound-assisted extraction and solid-phase extraction were introduced into the pretreatment procedure of the two complex environmental matrices. The critical steps involved in the sample pretreatment procedure and the instrumental analysis conditions were optimized progressively. Recoveries of the optimized method were good with 75.3-118.2% in wastewater and 82.8-130.1% in sludge. The absolute deviations of methods were lower than 11.7%, presenting a high reproducibility and precision. The limits of quantification for the eight pharmaceuticals in wastewater and sludge were 5-15 ng·L^-1 and 2-6 ng·g^-1, showing high sensitivity of the methods. The developed method has been successfully applied to evaluate the actual concentration levels of tetracyclines, quinolones, and sulfonamides in actual swine wastewater (maximum detected concentration of 87.377 μg·L^-1) and activated sludge (maximum detected concentration of 51242.3 ng·g^-1).

Influence of the hydraulic retention time on the removal of emerging contaminants in an anoxic-aerobic algal-bacterial photobioreactor coupled with anaerobic digestion

This work evaluated, for the first time, the performance of an integral microalgae-based domestic wastewater treatment system composed of an anoxic reactor and an aerobic photobioreactor, coupled with an anaerobic digester for converting the produced algal-bacterial biomass into biogas, with regards to the removal of 16 contaminants of emerging concern (CECs): penicillin G, tetracycline, enrofloxacin, ciprofloxacin, sulfamethoxazole, tylosin, trimethoprim, dexamethasone, ibuprofen, naproxen, acetaminophen, diclofenac, progesterone, carbamazepine, triclosan and propylparaben. The influence of the hydraulic retention time (HRT) in the anoxic-aerobic bioreactors (4 and 2.5 days) and in the anaerobic digester (30 and 10 days) on the fate of these CECs was investigated. The most biodegradable contaminants (removal efficiency >80% regardless of HRT) were tetracycline, ciprofloxacin, sulfamethoxazole, tylosin, trimethoprim, dexamethasone, ibuprofen, naproxen, acetaminophen and propylparaben (degraded predominantly in the anoxic-aerobic bioreactors), and tetracycline, sulfamethoxazole, tylosin, trimethoprim and naproxen (degraded predominantly in the anaerobic reactor). The anoxic-aerobic bioreactors provided removal of at least 48% for all CECs tested. The most recalcitrant contaminants in the anaerobic reactor, which were not removed at any of the HRT tested, were enrofloxacin, ciprofloxacin, progesterone and propylparaben.

Development and validation of a highly effective analytical method for the evaluation of the exposure of migratory birds to antibiotics and their metabolites by faeces analysis

The widespread occurrence of antibiotics in the environment may exert a negative impact on wild organisms. In addition, they can become environmental reservoirs, through the ingestion of food or contaminated water, and vectors for antibiotic-resistant bacteria. This fact is even more important in migratory birds that can promote their dissemination across continents. In this work, a multiresidue analytical method suitable for the determination of five families of antibiotics and their main metabolites in waterbird faeces has been developed and validated. The target compounds include environmentally significant sulfonamides, macrolides, fluoroquinolones, tetracyclines and antifolates. Sample treatment involves ultrasound-assisted extraction with methanol and dispersive solid-phase extraction clean-up with C18. Analytical determination was carried out by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry. The most significant parameters affecting sample extraction and extract clean-up were optimised by means of experimental designs. Good linearity (R² > 0.994), accuracy (from 41 to 127%), precision (relative standard deviation lower than 24%) and limits of quantification (lower than 2 ng g^-1 (dry weight, dw)) were obtained for most of the compounds. The method was applied to the determination of the selected compounds in 27 faeces samples from three common migratory waterbird species. Nine antibiotics and three of their metabolites were detected in the analysed samples. Fluoroquinolones and macrolides were the antibiotics most frequently detected. The highest concentrations corresponded to norfloxacin (up to 199 ng g^-1 dw).

Determination of veterinary drugs in microalgae biomass from photobioreactors fed with piggery wastewater

Concentration data of veterinary drugs in microalgae biomass collected from photobioreactors fed with piggery wastewaters are presented for the first time in this work. To this aim, a QuEChERS methodology and an ultrasound-assisted solid-liquid extraction have been assessed as sample preparation procedures with the purpose of determining 20 veterinary drugs, mainly antibiotics of different physico-chemical properties in addition to dexamethasone, fenbendazole and progesterone. Some critical operation parameters of the QuEChERS procedure were optimized by an experimental design but tetracycline, oxytetracycline, doxycycline, marbofloxacin and ciprofloxacin were not detected by the QuEChERS sample preparation. The use of a longer and thorough approach, a solid-liquid extraction with water/methanol in presence of primary secondary amine as a clean-up agent followed by solid-phase extraction on Oasis HLB cartridges, is recommended to monitor all intended analytes. The determination in extracts is carried out by ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry in selected reaction monitoring mode. Limits of detection about 0.2-42 ng per g of lyophilized microalgae sample, and repeatabilities about 6-46% (n = 5, RSDs) are reached. The solid-liquid extraction method was applied to microalgae biomass samples collected from a photobioreactor. Nine drugs were detected in the samples at relatively low concentration and a proportional relationship between the found concentrations and the octanol/water partition coefficients of the drugs has been outlined. Moreover, a linear ratio between the concentrations measured in biomass and effluent has been observed for most of the drugs.

Natural treatment system for wastewater (NTSW) in a livestock farm, with five years of pilot plant management and monitoring

This paper reports results of a 5-year trial study of a natural treatment system for wastewater (NTSW) on a livestock pig farm on Gran Canaria (Canary Islands, Spain). The pilot plant consist of a rotary screen, a first-generation multi-chamber digester, and two horizontal subsurface flow treatment wetlands (HSFCW) with a pond installed between them. Results show that the removal efficiency of total chemical oxygen demand (CODt), total suspended solids (TSS), volatile solids (VS) and total dissolved solids (TDS) of the treatment were 91.77%, 95.99%, 82.62%, and 55.78%, respectively. Other removal values include 93.79% for total nitrogen (TN) and 93.05% for phosphorus (P₂O₅). The results demonstrate the suitability of NTSW solutions applied to livestock waste in pig farms and their potential application to other farms of similar size.