Chemical fractionation and health risk assessment of particulate matter-bound metals in Pune, India

Abstract

The present study deals with the assessment of sequential extraction of particulate matter (PM)-bound metals and the potential health risks associated with them in a growing metropolitan city (Pune) of India. The average mass concentration of both PM and PM exceeded the National Ambient Air Quality Standards. Significant seasonal variation in mass concentration was found for both size fractions of PM with higher values in winter season and lower in monsoon. Chemical species of the studied trace metals in PM exhibited significant differences, due to difference in sources of pollution. Metals such as Cd, Pb, and Cr in both size fractions and Zn and Co in fine fraction were more efficiently extracted in mobile fractions showing their mobile nature while Ni and Fe showed reduced mobility. Fe showed the highest concentrations among all the analyzed elements in both coarse (PM) and fine (PM) PM, while Cd showed least concentration in both size fractions. PCA identified industrial emissions, vehicular activity, coal combustion, diesel exhaust, waste incineration, electronic waste processing, constructional activities, soil, and road dust as probable contributors responsible for the metallic fraction of PM. All the metals showed varying contamination in PM samples. The contamination was higher for fine particles than coarse ones. The average global contamination factor was found to be 27.0-34.3 in coarse and fine PM, respectively. The hazard quotient (HQ) estimated for Cd, Co, and Ni (both total and easily accessible concentrations) exceeded the safe level (HQ = 1), indicating that these metals would result in non-carcinogenic health effects to the exposed population. The HQ ranged from 9.1 × 10 for Cu (coarse) to 8.3 for Ni (fine) PM. The cancer risk for Cd, Ni, and Cr in both sized PM were much higher than the acceptable limits of USEPA.

Health Risk Assessment of PM2.5 and PM2.5-Bound Trace Elements in Thohoyandou, South Africa

“…Lastly, it is worth noting that the equations we used for calculating the HQ (Equation (2)) are analogous to the ones used by a number of other studies [20][21][22]53], but different from others [17,54]. We define the HQ as the quotient between the actual dose of the exposed subgroup (FADD) and the established safe dose (SADD) calculated from exposure to a benchmark concentration of PM 2.5 in a standard population.…”

“…In this way, we obtain a unitless HQ. In contrast, Jan et al [54] and Morakinyo et al [17] define their HQ as the quotient of the field dose and the benchmark concentration itself, i.e., a quotient of a dose and a concentration, which, apart from making the HQ unit dependent, bears the risk of understating health risks, with potential implications on public health.…”

Ecotoxicity testing of airborne particulate matter—comparison of sample preparation techniques for the Vibrio fischeri assay

“…Bioaccessibility is considered an important factor when potential impacts are to be evaluated (Thums et al, 2008;Turner, 2011) or regulatory frameworks for assessment protocols are addressed (Kim et al, 2015). Several studies have supported the strong influence of bioavailability of particulate-bound compounds on ecotoxic impact (Č vančarová et al, 2013;Jan et al, 2018;Sah et al, 2019;Varshney et al, 2016).…”

Integrated Assessment of Affinity to Chemical Fractions and Environmental Pollution with Heavy Metals: A New Approach Based on Sequential Extraction Results

“…In this method, a bulk sample of soil, road dust, or other media is separated into its constituent particle size fractions (that is, G-analysis [97]), and then, for each G-fraction, a sequential extraction of HM chemical fractions (F-analysis) is carried out. Due to the laboriousness and complexity of interpretation of the obtained results, this approach is used not so often and is mainly devoted to the study of agricultural [98] and roadside soils [99], road dust [55,57,100], bottom sediments [101], and atmospheric aerosols [102,103]. For example, in six particle size fractions of road dust (<63 µm, 63-125 µm, 125-250 µm, 250-500 µm, 500-1000 µm, 1000-2000 µm) in the Palolo Valley, Hawaii, USA, the distribution of sequentially extracted by the BCR method acid-soluble, reducible, oxidizable, and residual fractions of Al, Zn, Pb, and Cu were analyzed [84], that is, 6G × 4F = 24 GF-fractions of each element were studied.…”

“…When choosing publications for the core data, we followed several requirements: (1) The publication should provide initial data on the content of each chemical fraction of HMs; (2) if possible, the paper should be recently published (after 2017); (3) as many metals as possible should be analyzed; (4) different metal fractionation schemes should be used for different environments. The following studies were selected: for soils, by Y. Li et al [86]; for bottom sediments, by X. Gao et al [111]; for aerosols, by R. Jan et al [102]; for particle size fractions of road dust, by A. Jayarathne et al [100]. For bottom sediments, the publication of 2010 was chosen since the content of 12 chemical elements was analyzed there, while usually only 3-6 elements are studied in such kinds of papers.…”