Easy and fast extraction methods to determine organochlorine pesticides in sewage sludge,soil, and water samples based at low temperature

Organochlorine pesticides present in sewage sludge can contaminate soil and water when they are used as either fertilizer or agricultural soil conditioner. In this study, the technique solid–liquid extraction with low temperature purification was optimized and validated for determination of ten organochlorine pesticides in sewage sludge and soil samples. Liquid–liquid extraction with low temperature purification was also validated for the same compounds in water. Analyses were performed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry operating in the selective ion monitoring mode. After optimization, the methods showed recoveries between 70% and 115% with relative standard deviation lower than 13% for all target analytes in the three matrices. The linearity was demonstrated in the range of 20 to 70 µg L^?1, 0.5 to 60 µg L^?1, and 3 to 13 µg L^?1, for sludge, soil, and acetonitrile, respectively. The limit of quantification ranged between 2 and 40 µg kg^?1, 1 and 6 µg kg^?1, and 0.5 µg L^?1 for sludge, soil, and water, respectively. The methods were used in the study of pesticide lixiviation carried out in a poly vinyl chlorine column filled with soil, which had its surface layer mixed with sludge. The results showed that pesticides are not leached into soil, part of them is adsorbed by the sewage sludge (4–40%), and most pesticides are lost by volatilization.     

Wastewater treatment and public health in Nunavut: a microbial risk assessment framework for the Canadian Arctic

Wastewater management in Canadian Arctic communities is influenced by several geographical factors including climate, remoteness, population size, and local food-harvesting practices. Most communities use trucked collection services and basic treatment systems, which are capable of only low-level pathogen removal. These systems are typically reliant solely on natural environmental processes for treatment and make use of existing lagoons, wetlands, and bays. They are operated in a manner such that partially treated wastewater still containing potentially hazardous microorganisms is released into the terrestrial and aquatic environment at random times. Northern communities rely heavily on their local surroundings as a source of food, drinking water, and recreation, thus creating the possibility of human exposure to wastewater effluent. Human exposure to microbial hazards present in municipal wastewater can lead to acute gastrointestinal illness or more severe disease. Although estimating the actual disease burdens associated with wastewater exposures in Arctic communities is challenging, waterborne- and sanitation-related illness is believed to be comparatively higher than in other parts of Canada. This review offers a conceptual framework and evaluation of current knowledge to enable the first microbial risk assessment of exposure scenarios associated with food-harvesting and recreational activities in Arctic communities, where simplified wastewater systems are being operated.     

Pesticide dispersion by spraying under tropical conditions

Pesticide air pollution by spraying was evaluated under different temperature, humidity and wind climatic conditions in Brazil. Field experiments were performed with application towards the soil and in guava orchards, where spray dispersion was monitored by adding p-aminobenzoic acid (PABA), a fluorescent substance, as a tracer to the water contained in the spray tanks. Samples were collected with filter membranes (Whatman 180025), and the PABA was extracted from the filters by shaking with water in a Petri dish and measured in a spectrofluorometer. A spray aimed towards the soil with filters positioned on the ground and hung at different heights did not show different upward dispersion as observed when lateral pulverization was conducted. In this case, a tractor with a sprayer moved through a 3 m high and 6 m wide frame with filter membranes mounted at 60 cm intervals. Spray dispersion patterns were modified by guava leaf resistance. No influence of temperature and humidity was observed in this short-lived spraying process. Nevertheless, wind drift can occur during airborne dispersion and is an important pesticide pollution source which requires control. Droplets with PABA powered by assisted spraying upwards returned to the ground by gravity and, therefore, did not constitute a vertical source of atmospheric pollution.     

Hospital admissions in Iran for cardiovascular and respiratory diseases attributed to the Middle Eastern Dust storms

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - The main objective of this study was to assess the possible effects of airborne particulate matter less than 10 μm in diameter (PM10)...     

Oxidative damage to Pseudomonas aeruginosa ATCC 27833 and Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 24213 induced by CuO-NPs

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - The cytotoxicity of nanoparticles (NPs) and their properties are important issues in nanotechnology research. Particularly, NPs affect the metabolism...     

Differentiating the effects of climate and land use change on European biodiversity: A scenario analysis

Current observed as well as projected changes in biodiversity are the result of multiple interacting factors, with land use and climate change often marked as most important drivers. We aimed to disentangle the separate impacts of these two for sets of vascular plant, bird, butterfly and dragonfly species listed as characteristic for European dry grasslands and wetlands, two habitats of high and threatened biodiversity. We combined articulations of the four frequently used SRES climate scenarios and associated land use change projections for 2030, and assessed their impact on population trends in species (i.e. whether they would probably be declining, stable or increasing). We used the BIOSCORE database tool, which allows assessment of the effects of a range of environmental pressures including climate change as well as land use change. We updated the species lists included in this tool for our two habitat types. We projected species change for two spatial scales: the EU27 covering most of Europe, and the more restricted biogeographic region of ‘Continental Europe’. Other environmental pressures modelled for the four scenarios than land use and climate change generally did not explain a significant part of the variance in species richness change. Changes in characteristic bird and dragonfly species were least pronounced. Land use change was the most important driver for vascular plants in both habitats and spatial scales, leading to a decline in 50–100% of the species included, whereas climate change was more important for wetland dragonflies and birds (40–50 %). Patterns of species decline were similar in continental Europe and the EU27 for wetlands but differed for dry grasslands, where a substantially lower proportion of butterflies and birds declined in continental Europe, and 50 % of bird species increased, probably linked to a projected increase in semi-natural vegetation. In line with the literature using climate envelope models, we found little divergence among the four scenarios. Our findings suggest targeted policies depending on habitat and species group. These are, for dry grasslands, to reduce land use change or its effects and to enhance connectivity, and for wetlands to mitigate climate change effects.     

Untangling the proximate causes and underlying drivers of deforestation and forest degradation in Myanmar

Political transitions often trigger substantial environmental changes. In particular, deforestation can result from the complex interplay among the components of a system—actors, institutions, and existing policies—adapting to new opportunities. A dynamic conceptual map of system components is particularly useful for systems in which multiple actors, each with different worldviews and motivations, may be simultaneously trying to alter different facets of the system, unaware of the impacts on other components. In Myanmar, a global biodiversity hotspot with the largest forest area in mainland Southeast Asia, ongoing political and economic reforms are likely to change the dynamics of deforestation drivers. A fundamental conceptual map of these dynamics is therefore a prerequisite for interventions to reduce deforestation. We used a system‐dynamics approach and causal‐network analysis to determine the proximate causes and underlying drivers of forest loss and degradation in Myanmar from 1995 to 2016 and to articulate the linkages among them. Proximate causes included infrastructure development, timber extraction, and agricultural expansion. These were stimulated primarily by formal agricultural, logging, mining, and hydropower concessions and economic investment and social issues relating to civil war and land tenure. Reform of land laws, the link between natural resource extraction and civil war, and the allocation of agricultural concessions will influence the extent of future forest loss and degradation in Myanmar. The causal‐network analysis identified priority areas for policy interventions, for example, creating a public registry of land‐concession holders to deter corruption in concession allocation. We recommend application of this analytical approach to other countries, particularly those undergoing political transition, to inform policy interventions to reduce forest loss and degradation.     

Combining land-use planning and tenure security: a tenure responsive land-use planning approach for developing countries

There is tenure insecurity around land ownerships and land rights in most developing countries. There are also many land-use planning projects being implemented in these countries. Often, land-use planning exists in these countries but is not formally linked with tenure security. This study argues that combining them by conducting land-use planning in a way that promotes tenure security presents a new approach. A central premise for the rationale of this intervention is that processes of land-use planning may inadvertently increase tenure security. By way of methodology, it evaluates land-use planning case studies from Africa, Asia and South America. It uses the three case study examples to build a case for making tenure security one of the major planned outcomes of a land-use planning process and provides a detailed framework for operationalising the concept. Its main contribution to the literature is that it introduces the concept of tenure responsive land-use planning.     

Patterns of biodiversity and habitat sensitivity in agricultural landscapes

Design of landscape is the process of the arrangement of spatial features with the objective of sustaining ecosystem services, and maintaining ecological functionality to meet societal needs. Along a gradient of cultivation intensity, the functional quality of agricultural landscape was explored and the relationships between landscape metrics and functional quality were analyzed, in order to make effective recommendations for landscape design aimed at sustainable land use schemes. The functional quality of landscape was calculated using the InVest model for 20 farm landscapes (North-Eastern Italy) where biodiversity (plant taxa) and sensitivity to disturbance (hemeroby) were used as model inputs. Results highlighted the importance of specific habitat types such as meadows and woodlands rather than other habitats for improving the biodiversity of agricultural landscapes. A high proportion of these habitats enhanced the functional quality of the landscape when the habitats were organized in large and not isolated patches in heterogeneous landscapes.     

Induction of enhanced methane oxidation in compost: temperature and moisture response

Landfilling is one of the most common ways of municipal solid waste disposal. Degradation of organic waste produces CH(4) and other landfill gases that significantly contribute to global warming. However, before entering the atmosphere, part of the produced CH(4) can be oxidised while passing through the landfill cover. In the present study, the oxidation rate of CH(4) was studied with various types of compost as possible landfill cover. The influence of incubation time, moisture content and temperature on the CH(4) oxidation capacity of different types of compost was examined. It was observed that the influence of moisture content and temperature on methane oxidation is time-dependent. Maximum oxidation rates were observed at moisture contents ranging from 45% to 110% (dry weight basis), while the optimum temperature ranged from 15 to 30 degrees C.