Workflow to facilitate the detection of new psychoactive substances and drugs of abuse in influent urban wastewater

Richard Bade; Denice van Herwerden; Nikolaos Rousis; Sangeet Adhikari; Darren Allen; Christine Baduel; Lubertus Bijlsma; Tim Boogaerts; Dan Burgard; Andrew Chappell; Erin M Driver; Fernando Fabriz Sodre; Despo Fatta-Kassinos; Emma Gracia-Lor; Elisa Gracia-Marín; Rolf U Halden; Ester Heath; Emma Jaunay; Alex Krotulski; Foon Yin Lai; Arndís Sue Ching Löve; Jake W O'Brien; Jeong-Eun Oh; Daniel Pasin; Marco Pineda Castro; Magda Psichoudaki; Noelia Salgueiro-Gonzalez; Cezar Silvino Gomes; Bikram Subedi; Kevin V Thomas; Nikolaos Thomaidis; Degao Wang; Viviane Yargeau; Saer Samanipour; Jochen Mueller

doi:10.1016/j.jhazmat.2024.133955

Workflow to facilitate the detection of new psychoactive substances and drugs of abuse in influent urban wastewater

J Hazard Mater. 2024 May 5:469:133955. doi: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2024.133955. Epub 2024 Mar 5.

Authors

Richard Bade¹, Denice van Herwerden², Nikolaos Rousis³, Sangeet Adhikari⁴, Darren Allen⁵, Christine Baduel⁶, Lubertus Bijlsma⁷, Tim Boogaerts⁸, Dan Burgard⁹, Andrew Chappell¹⁰, Erin M Driver¹¹, Fernando Fabriz Sodre¹², Despo Fatta-Kassinos¹³, Emma Gracia-Lor¹⁴, Elisa Gracia-Marín⁷, Rolf U Halden¹⁵, Ester Heath¹⁶, Emma Jaunay¹⁷, Alex Krotulski¹⁸, Foon Yin Lai¹⁹, Arndís Sue Ching Löve²⁰, Jake W O'Brien²¹, Jeong-Eun Oh²², Daniel Pasin²³, Marco Pineda Castro²⁴, Magda Psichoudaki¹³, Noelia Salgueiro-Gonzalez²⁵, Cezar Silvino Gomes²⁶, Bikram Subedi²⁷, Kevin V Thomas³, Nikolaos Thomaidis²⁸, Degao Wang²⁹, Viviane Yargeau²⁴, Saer Samanipour³⁰, Jochen Mueller³

Affiliations

¹ Queensland Alliance for Environmental Health Sciences (QAEHS), The University of Queensland, 20 Cornwall Street, Woolloongabba, Queensland 4102, Australia. Electronic address: r.bade@uq.edu.au.
² Van't Hoff Institute for Molecular Sciences (HIMS), University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
³ Queensland Alliance for Environmental Health Sciences (QAEHS), The University of Queensland, 20 Cornwall Street, Woolloongabba, Queensland 4102, Australia.
⁴ School of Sustainable Engineering and Built Environment, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, United States; Biodesign Center for Environmental Health Engineering, Biodesign Institute, Arizona State University, 1001 S. McAllister Ave., Tempe, AZ 85281, United States.
⁵ Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital, Herston, QLD 4029, Australia.
⁶ Université Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, IRD, Grenoble INP, Institute of Environmental Geosciences (IGE), Grenoble, France.
⁷ Environmental and Public Health Analytical Chemistry, Research Institute for Pesticides and Water, University Jaume I, Avda, Sos Baynat s/n, E-12071 Castellón, Spain.
⁸ Toxicological Centre, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Antwerp, 2610 Wilrijk, Belgium.
⁹ Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Puget Sound, Tacoma, WA 98416, United States.
¹⁰ Institute of Environmental Science and Research Limited (ESR), Christchurch Science Centre, 27 Creyke Road, Ilam, Christchurch 8041, New Zealand.
¹¹ Biodesign Center for Environmental Health Engineering, Biodesign Institute, Arizona State University, 1001 S. McAllister Ave., Tempe, AZ 85281, United States.
¹² Institute of Chemistry, University of Brasília, Brasília, DF 70910-000, Brazil.
¹³ Nireas-International Water Research Centre and Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Cyprus, P.O. Box 20537, 1678 Nicosia, Cyprus.
¹⁴ Department of Analytical Chemistry, Faculty of Chemistry, Complutense University of Madrid, Avenida Complutense s/n, 28040 Madrid, Spain.
¹⁵ School of Sustainable Engineering and Built Environment, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, United States; Biodesign Center for Environmental Health Engineering, Biodesign Institute, Arizona State University, 1001 S. McAllister Ave., Tempe, AZ 85281, United States; OneWaterOneHealth, Arizona State University Foundation, 1001 S. McAllister Avenue, Tempe, AZ 85287-8101, United States.
¹⁶ Jožef Stefan Institute and International Postgraduate School Jožef Stefan, Jamova 39, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia.
¹⁷ Health and Biomedical Innovation, UniSA: Clinical and Health Sciences, University of South Australia, Adelaide 5001, South Australia, Australia.
¹⁸ Center for Forensic Science Research and Education, Fredric Rieders Family Foundation, Willow Grove, PA 19090, United States.
¹⁹ Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), SE-75007 Uppsala, Sweden.
²⁰ University of Iceland, Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Hofsvallagata 53, 107 Reykjavik, Iceland; University of Iceland, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hofsvallagata 53, 107 Reykjavik, Iceland.
²¹ Queensland Alliance for Environmental Health Sciences (QAEHS), The University of Queensland, 20 Cornwall Street, Woolloongabba, Queensland 4102, Australia; Van't Hoff Institute for Molecular Sciences (HIMS), University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
²² Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Pusan National University, Jangjeon-dong, Geumjeong-gu, Busan 46241, Republic of Korea.
²³ Forensic Laboratory Division, San Francisco Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, 1 Newhall St, San Francisco, CA 94124, United States.
²⁴ Department of Chemical Engineering, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada.
²⁵ Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri IRCCS, Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Via Mario Negri 2, 20156 Milan, Italy.
²⁶ Laboratory of Forensic Chemistry, Brazilian Federal Police, PB, Brazil.
²⁷ Department of Chemistry, Murray State University, Murray, KY 42071-3300, United States.
²⁸ Laboratory of Analytical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Panepistimiopolis Zografou, 15771 Athens, Greece.
²⁹ College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Dalian Maritime University, No. 1 Linghai Road, Dalian 116026, PR China.
³⁰ Van't Hoff Institute for Molecular Sciences (HIMS), University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands; UvA Data Science Center, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

PMID: 38457976
DOI: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2024.133955

Abstract

The complexity around the dynamic markets for new psychoactive substances (NPS) forces researchers to develop and apply innovative analytical strategies to detect and identify them in influent urban wastewater. In this work a comprehensive suspect screening workflow following liquid chromatography - high resolution mass spectrometry analysis was established utilising the open-source InSpectra data processing platform and the HighResNPS library. In total, 278 urban influent wastewater samples from 47 sites in 16 countries were collected to investigate the presence of NPS and other drugs of abuse. A total of 50 compounds were detected in samples from at least one site. Most compounds found were prescription drugs such as gabapentin (detection frequency 79%), codeine (40%) and pregabalin (15%). However, cocaine was the most found illicit drug (83%), in all countries where samples were collected apart from the Republic of Korea and China. Eight NPS were also identified with this protocol: 3-methylmethcathinone 11%), eutylone (6%), etizolam (2%), 3-chloromethcathinone (4%), mitragynine (6%), phenibut (2%), 25I-NBOH (2%) and trimethoxyamphetamine (2%). The latter three have not previously been reported in municipal wastewater samples. The workflow employed allowed the prioritisation of features to be further investigated, reducing processing time and gaining in confidence in their identification.

Keywords: High-resolution mass spectrometry; Illicit drugs; New Psychoactive Substances; Suspect screening; Wastewater-based epidemiology.

MeSH terms

China
Illicit Drugs*
Psychotropic Drugs
Wastewater
Water Pollutants, Chemical* / analysis
Workflow

Substances

Wastewater
Psychotropic Drugs
Illicit Drugs
Water Pollutants, Chemical