Emerging Environmental Contaminants: Potential Toxicity and Treatment Technologies
A special issue of Applied Sciences (ISSN 2076-3417). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Sciences".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 20 September 2026 | Viewed by 193
Special Issue Editors
Interests: environmental toxicology; potentially toxic elements; pesticides; genotoxicity; bioessays; environmental quality; enviromental risk assessment; persistent organic pollutants; environmental technology; sustainability
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
In recent decades, the number and diversity of chemical substances released into the environment have increased markedly, giving rise to a broad class of emerging environmental contaminants. These substances, often referred to as novel entities within the planetary boundaries framework, include compounds whose production, use, environmental fate, and toxicological effects are not yet fully understood. Growing scientific evidence indicates that many of these contaminants pose significant risks to human health and ecosystems, even at trace concentrations, through chronic exposure, bioaccumulation, and the formation of secondary metabolites. This situation highlights the need for improved monitoring, risk assessment, and effective remediation strategies across environmental systems.
The aim of this Special Issue is to consolidate high-quality original research articles and review papers that provide comprehensive insights into the occurrence, behavior, toxicity, and treatment of emerging environmental contaminants. It integrates applied analytical methods, environmental engineering solutions, material sciences, biological sciences, and interdisciplinary approaches to address environmental and public health challenges. This Special Issue welcomes manuscripts that explore, but are not limited to, the following themes:
- Monitoring of emerging contaminants in soil, water, sediments, air, and bioindicator organisms;
- Advanced analytical techniques for sampling, extraction, identification, and quantification of emerging contaminants;
- Emerging contaminants’ fate and transport, transformation, and formation of secondary metabolites in the environment;
- Human exposure analysis and health risk assessment;
- Ecotoxicological risk evaluation supported by environmental monitoring and bioassays;
- Identification of toxicity mechanisms using bioassays as well as computational approaches such as modeling, simulation, and in silico toxicology;
- Innovative remediation and treatment systems for soil, water, and air, including adsorption, biodegradation, catalysis, advanced oxidation processes, and other novel or hybrid technologies;
- Regulatory frameworks, public policies, environmental quality standards, concentration limits in environmental matrices, and emission thresholds related to emerging contaminants.
Dr. Jorge L. Gallego
Dr. Efraím A. Serna-Galvis
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Applied Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- novel entities
- endocrine disruption
- environmental fate
- advanced oxidation processes
- health risk assessment
- mixture toxicity
- secondary metabolites
- bioaccumulation and biomagnification
- sentinel species
- chronic exposure
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