We have studied, in a protected area with intense hunting activity, the consequences of the abandonment of facilities and tailings of a metal mine. The area studied has the peculiarity of having a steep slope and containing a water reservoir for irrigation and human consumption. Soil, sludge, vegetation, and water samples were analyzed, in which many metal(loid)s exceeded the generic reference levels (NGR) established for the health of the ecosystem. The concentration of Tl in the soils ranged between 300 and 700 mg kg, because of continuous diffuse pollution, produced both by the alteration of sphalerite and the combustion products of a coal-fired power plant near the study area. Soil concentrations of Pb (250-1500 mg kg) and Zn (350-700 mg kg) from the tailings indicate extreme contamination in the areas adjacent to them and in the reservoir. The contamination affects the water quality of the stream running through the study area, with 64 μg L of Tl and 9.1 μg L of Zn having been detected in the reservoir water. To ensure protection of human and ecosystem health, the following is proposed: (i) soil stabilization for erosion control and reduction of diffuse pollution, (ii) monitoring of soils for agricultural use and water quality, and (iii) study the impact of contamination on wildlife, both hunting and non-game species. Given their capacity to accumulate heavy metals it is proposed to use Cistus ladanifer, Lavandula stoechas and Retama sphaerocarpa as phytoremedial species. The novelty of this research lies in two considerations. First, a proposal for the analysis of environmental compartments as an interconnected and interdependent network in terms of impacts and their repercussions on the ES. Secondly, the application of the model DPSIR, which assumes that anthropogenic activities have an impact on the environment.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2022.114036 | DOI Listing |
Sci Rep
January 2025
Department of Chemistry, College of Science, King Saud University, PO Box 2455, Riyadh, 11541, Saudi Arabia.
The ongoing challenge of water pollution necessitates innovative approaches to remove organic contaminants from wastewater. In this work, new two-dimensional S-scheme heterojunction photocatalysts BiO/CdS and MoS/BiO/CdS that are intended for the effective photocatalytic destruction of 4-nitrophenol, a dangerous organic pollutant, are synthesized and characterized. Utilizing a solvothermal method, successfully generated these ternary nanocomposites, which were characterized through various techniques including X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), high resolution transmission electronmicroscopy (HRTEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Telle (BET) and diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Colloid Interface Sci
January 2025
School of Resources, Environment and Materials, Guangxi University, Nanning 530004, China. Electronic address:
The limited transport of oxygen at the solid-liquid interface and the poor charge separation efficiency of single catalyst significantly impedes the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS), thereby weakening the application potential of photocatalytic technology in water pollution control. Herein, a hollow porous photocatalytic aerogel sphere (calcium alginate/cellulose nanofibers (CA/CNF)) loaded BiOBr/TiC, combining a favourable mass transfer structure with effective catalytic centers was firstly presented. The floatability and hollow pore structure facilitated rapid O transfer via a triphase interface, thereby promoting the generation of ROS.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Colloid Interface Sci
January 2025
School of Chemistry, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024 PR China. Electronic address:
The development of electrode materials for aqueous ammonium-ion supercapacitors (NH-SCs) has garnered significant attention in recent years. Poor intrinsic conductivity, sluggish electron transfer and ion diffusion kinetics, as well as structural degradation of vanadium oxides during the electrochemical process, pose significant challenges for their efficient ammonium-ion storage. In this work, to address the above issues, the core-shell VO·nHO@poly(3,4-ethylenedioxithiophene) composite (denoted as VOH@PEDOT) is designed and prepared by a simple agitation method to boost the ammonium-ion storage of VO·nHO (VOH).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFChemosphere
January 2025
DASCO Inc, Centennial, Colorado, USA.
This study thoroughly investigated the adsorption of Congo Red (CR) dye onto various microplastics (MPs), including high-density polyethylene (HDPE), polyvinyl chloride (PVC), low-density polyethylene (LDPE), polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET). Initial adsorption capacities (q) revealed that HDPE had the highest value (21.90 mg/g), followed by PVC (4.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSci Total Environ
January 2025
Department for Sustainable Food Process, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, 29122 Piacenza, Italy. Electronic address:
Polyethylene nanoplastics (NPs) are widely diffused in terrestrial environments, including soil ecosystems, but the stress mechanisms in plants are not well understood. This study aimed to investigate the effects of two increasing concentrations of NPs (20 and 200 mg kg of soil) in lettuce. To this aim, high-throughput hyperspectral imaging was combined with metabolomics, covering both primary (using NMR) and secondary metabolism (using LC-HRMS), along with lipidomics profiling (using ion-mobility-LC-HRMS) and plant performance.
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