Advanced Analysis of Organic Pollutants: Integrated Strategies for Soil, Water and Agri-Food Matrices

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to invite you to contribute to this Special Issue of Water entitled "Soil, Water and Agri-Food Matrices—Integrated Analytical Strategies for Organic Pollutants". This Special Issue aims to bring together high-quality research and critical perspectives addressing the analytical challenges associated with the occurrence and fate of organic pollutants across interconnected environmental and agri-food compartments.

Organic pollutants in soil, water, and agri-food matrices remain a persistent challenge for environmental protection and food safety, intensified by agricultural inputs, industrial emissions, and wastewater-derived contamination. Within the soil–water–food nexus, contaminants such as pesticides, pharmaceuticals, PFAS, industrial chemicals, and their transformation products can be transferred between compartments, creating combined exposure scenarios that align with the One Health perspective.

This Special Issue focuses on advanced, fit-for-purpose analytical chemistry workflows that enable robust detection, confident identification, and accurate quantification of organic pollutants in complex matrices. We particularly welcome studies employing LC/GC coupled to HRMS (e.g., Orbitrap, QTOF) and integrated strategies combining targeted and non-targeted analysis or suspect screening, supported by transparent data-processing pipelines (feature extraction, spectral interpretation, libraries/in silico tools, confidence levels). Strong emphasis is placed on QA/QC, method validation, matrix effects management, and measurement uncertainty, ensuring comparability and regulatory relevance. Contributions on greener sample preparation, harmonized protocols, and interlaboratory performance are also encouraged. By focusing on advanced analytical chemistry approaches and harmonized workflows, this Special Issue aims to stimulate interdisciplinary dialogue among environmental scientists, analytical chemists, and food safety experts, fostering robust and reproducible strategies that support monitoring, risk assessment, and regulatory decision-making. Topics include (but are not limited to) the following:

• Integrated soil–water–agri-food monitoring strategies (One Health, exposure pathways).
• Sampling design, representativeness, and spatiotemporal variability.
• Green and high-performance sample preparation (QuEChERS variants, SPE, microextraction, DES/NADES, etc.).
• LC–HRMS/GC–HRMS workflows: target, suspect, non-target screening.
• Transformation products, metabolites, and effect-directed analysis links.
• Data processing, chemometrics, identification confidence, and reporting standards.
• QA/QC plans, validation, matrix effects, and measurement uncertainty.
• Harmonization, interlaboratory comparisons, and decision-making for risk assessment/regulation.

Dr. Christina Nannou
Dr. Vasiliki Boti
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-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Water 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 2600 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.