Analysis of environmental endocrine disrupting activities in wastewater treatment plant effluents using recombinant yeast assays incorporated with exogenous metabolic activation system.

Objective: To measure the endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) in wastewater and evaluate the EDCs removal efficiencies in the municipal wastewater treatment plants (WWTP).

Methods: A battery of in vitro recombinant yeast bioassays incorporated with exogenous metabolic activation system (rat liver preparation, S9 mix) was conducted to assess the estrogen receptor (ER), androgen receptor (AR), progesterone receptor (PR), and thyroid receptor (TR) ant/agonistic activities of effluents collected from Datansha WWTP.

Results: The indirect estrogenic, anti-androgenic, anti-progesteronic, and anti-thyroidic activities were observed in the influent.

[Source and distribution characteristic of atmospheric organochlorine pesticides in the Pearl River Estuary and adjacent South China Sea].

Ship-board air samples were collected during the winter and spring cruise to the Pearl River Estuary (PRE) and adjacent South China Sea (SCS) in 2003 and were analyzed for organochlorine pesticides (OCPs). Meanwhile, air samples were collected at land-based sites in Guangzhou and Zhongshan for comparison. Results indicated that the detected OCPs were mainly of HCHs, DDTs and chlordane, its concentration ranged between 13-99, 73-390, 63-224 pg/m3 and 10-106, 429-1003, 1724-9638 pg/m3 during the winter and spring cruise, respectively.

Occurrence of brominated flame retardants other than polybrominated diphenyl ethers in environmental and biota samples from southern China.

The concentrations of three currently used non-polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) brominated flame retardants (BFRs), 1,2-bis(2,4,6-tribromophenoxy)ethane (BTBPE), decabromodiphenyl ethane (DBDPE), and tetrabromobisphenol A bis (2,3-dibromopropyl ether) (TBBPA-DBPE), were examined in environmental and biota samples collected from the Pearl River Delta (PRD) and an electronic waste (e-waste) area in southern China. We also examined deca-BDE (decabromodiphenyl ether) and nine tri- through hepta-BDE congeners for comparison. The results indicate that these non-PBDE BFRs occur widely in the environment of the two study areas.

Time trends of polybrominated diphenyl ethers in sediment cores from the Pearl River Estuary, South China.

The present study provides information on the time trend of PBDEs in three sediment cores from the Pearl River Estuary (PRE), South China, using 210Pb dating technique. The sigmaPBDEs (except for BDE 209) concentrations in all sediment cores increased gradually from the bottom (mid-1970s) to the middle layer (later 1980s and early 1990s) followed by different temporal trends in different locations to the surface sediments, reflecting the variations in the consumption of commercial penta-BDEs mixture in different regions of the Pearl River Delta. The BDE 209 concentrations remained constant until 1990 and thereafter increased exponentially to the present, with doubling times of 2.

[Over one hundred year sedimentary record of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in the Pearl River Estuary, South China].

The western shoal of the Lingding Bay is known to be an important deposition zone of terrestrial substance in the Pearl River Estuary (PRE). In this study, the vertical variations of concentration and fluxes of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) are investigated in a core from the west shoal of Lingding Bay. In combining with 210Pb-dating, the PAHs sedimentary record in the last 100 years is reconstructed.