Occurrence of Organochlorine Pesticides in Human Tissues Assessed Using a Microextraction Procedure and Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry

Multigenerational exposure to trace concentrations of DDT residues in Wistar rats: Effects on biometric development and biochemical parameters

The Organochlorine Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) and its residues, Dichlorodiphenyldichloroethane (DDD) and Dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene (DDE), are Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) that bioaccumulate, persist in the environment, and magnify through the food chain. Chronic exposure is linked to oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction, emphasizing the need to study its multigenerational impacts on health and development. This study investigated the effects of multigenerational exposure to DDT residues in Wistar rats. Pregnant females were provided water containing trace concentrations of p,p'-DDD (0.015 µM) and p,p'-DDE (0.006 µM) from the first day of gestation (PD0) until the end of the life cycle of two generations (F1 and F2). Biometric and biochemical evaluations were conducted at PND35 and PND105, including weight, naso-anal length, and abdominal circumference. Hepatic, renal, and adipose tissues were analyzed macro- and microscopically, along with biochemical analyses. Statistical analyses included ANOVA and generalized linear models. The hypothetical model confirmed that no significant variations occurred between generations, indicating that effects were driven by group, age, and sex differences. The analysis revealed that DDD/DDE synergism and female sex significantly influenced hepatic, renal, cerebral, and white adipose tissues. DDD/DDE exposure increased hepatic enzyme activity, reduced cerebral cholinesterase and renal antioxidants, and altered adipocyte mass. Age also influenced enzymatic activity and development, with notable differences between PND35 and PND105 in tissues and biometric indices. In conclusion, DDD/DDE exposure, particularly in females, significantly impacted hepatic, renal, cerebral, and adipose tissues. The results highlight that observed effects depend on group, age, and sex, emphasizing the risks associated with environmental contamination.

Pollutants in aquatic system: a frontier perspective of emerging threat and strategies to solve the crisis for safe drinking water

Water is an indispensable natural resource and is the most vital substance for the existence of life on earth. However, due to anthropogenic activities, it is being polluted at an alarming rate which has led to serious concern about water shortage across the world. Moreover, toxic contaminants released into water bodies from various industrial and domestic activities negatively affect aquatic and terrestrial organisms and cause serious diseases such as cancer, renal problems, gastroenteritis, diarrhea, and nausea in humans. Therefore, water treatments that can eliminate toxins are very crucial. Unfortunately, pollution treatment remains a difficulty when four broad considerations are taken into account: effectiveness, reusability, environmental friendliness, and affordability. In this situation, protecting water from contamination or creating affordable remedial techniques has become a serious issue. Although traditional wastewater treatment technologies have existed since antiquity, they are both expensive and inefficient. Nowadays, advanced sustainable technical approaches are being created to replace traditional wastewater treatment processes. The present study reviews the sources, toxicity, and possible remediation techniques of the water contaminants.

Review of scientific literature on available methods of assessing organochlorine pesticides in the environment

Organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) are persistent organic pollutants (POPs) widely used in agriculture and industry, causing serious health and ecological consequences upon exposure. This review offers a thorough overview of OCPs analysis emphasizing the necessity of ongoing work to enhance the identification and monitoring of these POPs in environmental and human samples. The benefits and drawbacks of the various OCPs analysis techniques including gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), gas chromatography-electron capture detector (GC-ECD), and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) are discussed. Challenges associated with validation and optimization criteria, including accuracy, precision, limit of detection (LOD), and limit of quantitation (LOQ), must be met for a method to be regarded as accurate and reliable. Suitable quality control measures, such as method blanks and procedural blanks, are emphasized. The LOD and LOQ are critical quality control measure for efficient quantification of these compounds, and researchers have explored various techniques for their calculation. Matrix interference, solubility, volatility, and partition coefficient influence OCPs occurrences and are discussed in this review. Validation experiments, as stated by European Commission in document SANTE/11813/2017, showed that the acceptance criteria for method validation of OCP analytes include ≤20 % for high precision, and 70-120 % for recovery. This may ultimately be vital for determining the human health risk effects of exposure to OCP and for formulating sensible environmental and public health regulations.

Effect of altered human exposome on the skin and mucosal epithelial barrier integrity

Pollution in the world and exposure of humans and nature to toxic substances is continuously worsening at a rapid pace. In the last 60 years, human and domestic animal health has been challenged by continuous exposure to toxic substances and pollutants because of uncontrolled growth, modernization, and industrialization. More than 350,000 new chemicals have been introduced to our lives, mostly without any reasonable control of their health effects and toxicity. A plethora of studies show exposure to these harmful substances during this period with their implications on the skin and mucosal epithelial barrier and increasing prevalence of allergic and autoimmune diseases in the context of the "epithelial barrier hypothesis". Exposure to these substances causes an epithelial injury with peri-epithelial inflammation, microbial dysbiosis and bacterial translocation to sub-epithelial areas, and immune response to dysbiotic bacteria. Here, we provide scientific evidence on the altered human exposome and its impact on epithelial barriers.

Cellulose Nanocrystals Induced Loose and Porous Graphite Phase Carbon Nitride/Porous Carbon Composites for Capturing and Determining of Organochlorine Pesticides from Water and Fruit Juice by Solid-Phase Microextraction

Herein, novel, loose, and porous graphite phase carbon nitride/porous carbon (g-C₃N₄@PC) composites were prepared by decorating cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs). The characterization results demonstrate that the as-prepared composites presented high specific surface areas, porous structures, and abundant chemical groups, with the modification of CNCs. In view of the unique advantages, g-C₃N₄@PC was used as the coating material for the solid-phase microextraction (SPME) of organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) in water and juice samples. The g-C₃N₄@PC-coated fibers showed better extraction efficiencies than commercial fibers (100/7 μm PDMS and PA) toward the OCPs, with the enrichment factors of the g-C₃N₄@PC-coated fibers 5-30 times higher than the latter. Using a gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) instrument, the g-C₃N₄@PC-coated fibers exhibited a gratifying analytical performance for determining low concentrations of OCPs, with a wide linear range (0.1-1600 ng L^-1 for water; 0.1-1000 ng L^-1 for juice), low limits of detection (0.0141-0.0942 ng L^-1 for water; 0.0245-0.0777 ng L^-1 for juice), and good reproducibility and repeatability in optimal conditions. The established method showed good sensitivity and recovery in the determination of OCPs in the water and fruit juice samples, which displayed broad prospects for analyzing organic pollutants from environmental samples.

Assessment of risks, implications, and opportunities of waterborne neurotoxic pesticides

Pesticides are a well-known family of chemicals that have contaminated water systems globally. Four common subfamilies of pesticides include organochlorines, organophosphates, pyrethroids, and carbamate insecticides which have been shown to adversely affect the human nervous system. Studies have shown a link between pesticide exposure and decreased viability, proliferation, migration, and differentiation of murine neural stem cells. Besides human exposure directly through water systems, additional factors such as pesticide bioaccumulation, biomagnification and potential synergism due to co-exposure to other environmental contaminants must be considered. A possible avenue to investigate the molecular mechanisms and biomolecules impacted by the various classes of pesticides includes the field of -omics. Discovery of the precise molecular mechanisms behind pesticide-mediated neurodegenerative disorders may facilitate development of targeted therapeutics. Likewise, discovery of pesticide biodegradation pathways may enable novel approaches for water system bioremediation using genetically engineered microorganisms. In this mini-review, we discuss recently established harmful impacts of various categories of pesticides on the nervous system and the application of -omics field for discovery, validation, and mitigation of pesticide neurotoxicity.

Biomonitoring of organochlorine pesticides and cancer survival: a population-based study

Organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) are endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) that even at very low levels can cause cancer by increasing the activity of tumor cells and suppressing the immune system. There is also little information on OCPs and survival after diagnosis. The aim of this study was to monitor the concentration of OCPs in the blood serum of cancer patients and its relationship with their socio-demographic characteristics and ultimately that impact on survival time and hazard ratio (HR). This cross-sectional study included 89 diagnosed patients with cancer in Isfahan, Iran. 12 types of OCPs were measured in serum by gas chromatography (7GC) with an electron capture detector and equipped with mass spectrometer (MS). Also, participants' questionnaire was completed to collect information. T-test, ANOVA, and Chi-square tests were used to evaluate the association between serum levels of OCPs and quantitative and qualitative information of patients. Survival analysis was also examined based on Kaplan-Meier method, log-rank test, and Cox model. The mean of total OCPs in patients' serum was calculated to be 1.82 ± 1.36 μg/L. Concentration of 2,4' DDE had a significant relationship with body mass index (BMI) (kg/m²) (P < 0.05). In addition, gender revealed a significant correlation in estimating survival time (P < 0.05). Non-exposure to OCPs showed a positive effect on increasing the life expectancy of patients. Lindane and endosulfan increased the risk of death by 16% and 37%, respectively, with insignificant P value (P > 0.05). The findings of the present study showed adverse effects of OCPs on patients' survival time and increased mortality of HR. Moreover, as the first research conducted in the study area, it is suggested management of environmental, individual and social factors that could be influenced the biological accumulation of OCPs in humans and cause health promotion.

An exposure to endocrine active persistent pollutants and endometriosis - a review of current epidemiological studies

Widespread exposure to persistent pollutants can disrupt the bodies' natural endocrine functions and contribute to reproductive diseases like endometriosis. In this review, we focus at the relationship between endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), including metals and trace elements, organochlorine pesticides (OCPs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), polybrominated biphenyls (PBBs), poly-brominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), polychlorinated dibenzodioxin (PCDDs), polychlorinated dibenzofurans (PCDFs), and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) exposure and risk of endometriosis. Relevant studies from the last 10 years by November 2022 were identified by searching Pubmed, Web of Science, and Scopus. The cohort and case-control studies that reported effect size with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of EDC exposure and endometriosis were selected. Twenty three articles examining the relationship between endometriosis and exposure to persistent EDCs were considered. Most of the studies indicated association with exposure to persistent chemicals and development of endometriosis. The consistent results were found in case of lead, PCB-28, PCB-138, PCB-153, PCB-180, PCB-201, 1,2,3,7,8 - PeCDD, 2,3,4,7,8 - PeCDF and all described OCPs, showing the increased risk of endometriosis. These results support that exposure to certain EDCs, including OCPs, PCBs, PBBs, PBDEs, PFAS, and lead increase the risk of endometriosis.

Sensitive detection of ferbam by coupling solid phase microextraction with surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy based on Au nano-glass capillary

In this study, we developed an innovative approach that combines solid phase microextraction (SPME) with surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) to detect pesticide ferbam rapidly. An Au nano-glass capillary was fabricated by coating template-freely synthesized three-dimensional network Au nanostructures (3D-NW AuNSs) on the roughened surface of glass capillary and used for SPME and SERS respectively. Significant Raman signals were obtained by the SPME-SERS method, followed by detection of ferbam in water and orange juice samples with only 1 min SPME process. Results showed that Au nano-glass capillaries could achieve the detection of ferbam with limit of detection of 0.05 μg/L, and coefficient of determination (R²) of 0.9913. The recovery of predicted results was in the range of 88.46-103.29% and the relative standard deviation (RSD) was 3.5-8.2%. This study demonstrated potential capability of the SPME-SERS method for rapid (within 1 min) and sensitive detection of organic compounds in complex matrices. The SERS-active Au nano-glass capillary is easy to carry and operate, and is expected to play a role in the detection of trace pollutants.

The role of adipose tissue analysis on Environmental Pollutants Biomonitoring in women: The European scenario

Humans are exposed every day to assorted environmental pollutants namely, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB), organochlorine pesticides (OCP), brominated flame-retardants (BFR), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), synthetic musks, heavy metals (e.g. cadmium) and plastic additives (e.g. bisphenol A, BPA). Besides environmental persistence, biomagnification and bioaccumulative properties, these pollutants are classified as endocrine disruptors (EDs), metabolic disruptors, neurologic disruptors. These compounds affect the normal function of several mechanisms in the human body being linked to human health issues as cancer development (e.g. breast, uterine and endometrial), miscarriage, birth defects, premature delivery and infertility. In order to prevent future health issue of women and possible progeny, the assessment of EDs accumulated is essential, particularly in adipose tissue. These samples have been referred as the ideal matrix to establish over time accumulation and long-term exposure of persistent and non-persistent lipophilic EDs. However, the invasive sample collection procedure and methodology processing discourages the usage of this matrix for biomonitoring studies. In this review, a Web of Science search without any publishing year restriction on the analysis in adipose tissue of PCB, OCP, BPA, cadmium, BFR and synthetic musks was performed. A total of 313 studies were found, 158 were European studies from which the studies with data on women EDs accumulation were selected for detailed analysis (n = 90). The results were structured and presented in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. The present paper is an overview on the existent EDs analytical methods and levels accumulated in women adipose tissue, with the correspondent health implications across Europe. The limits of detection and quantification were compared and a discussion with results obtained about the presence of ED was performed.