Special Issue "Potentially Toxic Elements Pollution in Urban and Suburban Environments"
A special issue of Toxics (ISSN 2305-6304). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Chemistry".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 20 October 2022 | Viewed by 5132
Special Issue Editor

Interests: environmental geochemistry; soil pollution; water pollution; environmental analysis and monitoring
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Pollution by potentially toxic elements (PTEs) is becoming a serious and widespread issue in all environmental matrices because of accelerated population growth rate, rapid industrialization and urbanization and other changes, which have occurred in most parts of the world in the last few decades. The increasingly worrying concern about the presence of PTEs in the environment has attracted considerable attention due to their potential impacts on ecosystem functioning and on public health because of their persistence and biotoxicity. PTEs can in fact be transferred into the human body as a consequence of dermal contact, inhalation and ingestion through the food chain and drinking water. Unfortunately, PTEs are ubiquitous in all environmental compartments, and they have been widely detected worldwide. In this context, environmental geochemistry and related subjects are elected matters to investigate, characterise and reveal the patterns of inorganic elements together with geostatistical computations that are used to identify source patterns of different pollutants related to underlying geological features and/or anthropogenic activities.
The present Special Issue would like to collect and compare case studies worldwide on behaviour, transport, fate and ecotoxicological state of PTEs in environmental matrices in both urban and suburban settings.
The topics of interest, on which authors are invited and welcome to submit original research papers, reviews and short communications, include but are not limited to the following keywords: potentially toxic elements (PTEs); environmental geochemistry; soil, sediment, water, air pollution; geogenic and anthropogenic pollutant input; bioavailability; PTEs mapping; spatial data analysis.
I look forward to receiving your contributions.
Dr. Ilaria Guagliardi
Guest Editor
Keywords
- potentially toxic elements (PTEs)
- environmental geochemistry
- soil, sediment, water, air pollution
- geogenic and anthropogenic pollutant input
- bioavailability
- PTE mapping
- spatial data analysis
Planned Papers
The below list represents only planned manuscripts. Some of these manuscripts have not been received by the Editorial Office yet. Papers submitted to MDPI journals are subject to peer-review.
Title: Potentially toxic elements in urban and suburban forest ecosystems in Poland: a review of national research
Authors: Magdalena Jastrzębska, Marta K. Kostrzewska
Affiliation: Department of Agroecosystems and Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry, University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, Plac Łódzki 3, 10-718 Olsztyn, Poland
Abstract: Based on national research, the paper presents the current knowledge on the pollution of Polish urban and suburban forests by potentially toxic elements (PTE). It begins by characterizing urban areas as sources and emitters of PTE into the environment and the channels through which PTE enter forest ecosystems. It then focuses on the content of PTE in biotic and abiotic elements of forest ecosystems in Poland. At the end, the potential consequences of PTE forest pollution and future challenges for research as a support tool for forest conservation, are summarized.
Title: Water-rock interaction processes: a local scale study on arsenic sources and release mechanisms from a volcanic rock matrix
Author: Daniele Parrone; Elisabetta Preziosi; Stefano Ghergo; Barbara Casentini
Affiliations: Water Research Institute - National Research Council (IRSA-CNR), 00015 Monterotondo, Rome, Italy
Abstracts: Arsenic is a potentially toxic element widely present in groundwater with concentrations often exceeding the WHO drinking water standard (10.0 μg/L), entailing an important risk to human health due to long-term exposure. We investigated its origin in groundwater in a study area located Northern of Rome (Italy), in a volcanic-sedimentary geological aquifer. Arsenic in groundwater ranges from 0.2 to 50.6 μg/L and does not exhibit a defined spatial distribution. Possible mineralogical sources and main mechanisms governing As mobilization from the solid matrix have been investigated by laboratory experiments, such as selective sequential extraction and dissolution tests micmicking different release condition from a representative volcanic tuff. Various potential As-bearing phases are present in the tuff samples, such as zeolites, iron oxides, calcite and pyrite. Results show that arsenic is mostly associated with low crystalline Fe oxy-hydroxides (1), with secondary fractions including specifically adsorbed As (2), coprecipitated or bound to calcite (3) and linked to sulfides (4). Arsenic is mainly released through desorption processes and reductive dissolution of Fe oxy-hydroxides.