Hydroxylated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in surface soil in an emerging urban conurbation in South China

Chong-Jing Gao; Lin-Lin Xia; Chen-Chou Wu; Hui-Min Shen; Ying Guo

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.07.334

Hydroxylated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in surface soil in an emerging urban conurbation in South China

Sci Total Environ. 2019 Nov 20:692:1250-1256. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.07.334. Epub 2019 Jul 21.

Authors

Chong-Jing Gao¹, Lin-Lin Xia¹, Chen-Chou Wu¹, Hui-Min Shen¹, Ying Guo²

Affiliations

¹ Guangdong Key Laboratory of Environmental Pollution and Health, School of Environment, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, China.
² Guangdong Key Laboratory of Environmental Pollution and Health, School of Environment, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, China. Electronic address: yingguo2004@jnu.edu.cn.

PMID: 31539956
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.07.334

Abstract

To investigate the effects of human activity on contaminants in regional soil, hydroxylated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (OH-PAHs) were measured in 187 surface soil samples of different land-use types collected from the Pearl River Delta (PRD), South China. The concentrations of Σ₉OH-PAH (sum of nine target analytes) ranged from 0.36 to 252ng/g (median: 5.98ng/g), with phenanthrene derivatives as the dominant components, accounting for ~70%. Among different land-use types, residency soil contained the highest levels of Σ₉OH-PAH (median: 11.3ng/g), followed by landfill soil (9.28ng/g), industry soil (7.51ng/g), agriculture soil (6.04ng/g), forestry soil (4.28ng/g) and drinking water source soil (4.20ng/g). A higher value was also observed in soil from the central PRD (6.94ng/g) than the surrounding areas (5.94ng/g), which indicated a significant impact of human activity on OH-PAH contamination in soil. Correlation and principal component analysis indicated that OH-PAHs in PRD soil are likely derived from the degradation of their parent PAHs in the atmosphere and/or soil and not directly from the same source as the parent PAHs. The ratios of OH-PAHs to their parent PAHs also varied among different land-use types, which may be partly attributed to the different populations of microorganisms in different soil types or the different chemical properties of PAHs and their metabolites.

Keywords: Human activity; Hydroxylated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons; Surface soil; The Pearl River Delta; Urban conurbation development.