With the rapid urbanization and industrialization, heavy metal contamination in urban soil and surface dust has received particular attention due to its negative effects on the eco-environment and human health. Contamination and spatio-temporal characteristics, contamination sources, and source apportionment methods, as well as the ecological and health risks of heavy metals in urban soil and surface dust were reviewed. The knowledge gaps in current research and prospects of future works were proposed. Four key points were presented, including improving the research on the interaction mechanism of heavy metals in urban soil and surface dust under complex conditions, enriching verification methods to improve the source apportionment reliability of anthropogenic metals by receptor models, strengthening the research on chemical forms of heavy metals from different sources and their short-term accumulation processes in surface dust, and raising the credibility of ecological and health risk forecast of heavy metals by integrating the improved exposure parameters and chemical forms.
Keywords: heavy metals; risk assessment; sources apportionment; spatial and temporal variations; urban soil and surface dust.