Pollutants perfluorinated compounds

Industrial organic pollutants Perfluorinated compounds (PFCs), polybrominated diphenylethers (PBDEs), new pesticides, and nanomaterials. 

Sometimes for some very potent pollutants analytical methodologies provide limits of detection (LODs) higher than the concentrations that cause effects, as derived from ecotoxicological studies. Therefore efforts in the field of analytical chemistry (see Sect. 2) are focused on making available the necessary analytical capabilities to detect pollutants at the required low levels found in the environment. This was the case of pharmaceuticals, illicit drugs, perfluorinated compounds (PFCs), sunscreens/UV filters, etc. few years ago. However, this list is likely to increase with new family candidates. 

Apart from of investigating the concentration of priority pollutants to assess the temporal and geographic trends as it has been done in the Ebro river basin until nowadays, the SCARCE project pretends to evaluate the consequences of the climate change in the water quality as well as predicting new environmental risks derived from water scarcity. This will be done by determining the presence of new priority (i.e. perfluorinated compounds) and emerging toxicants in Mediterranean river ecosystems in the Iberian Peninsula. In a subsequent step, the effects of chemical and environmental stressors on the biota will be assessed by combining field and experimental studies. The effects of multiple stressors will be addressed from a multi-biomarker perspective [27]. 

Gomez, C., Vicente, J., Echavarri-Erasun, B., Porte, C., and Lacorte, S. 2011. Occurrence of perfluorinated compounds in water, sediment and mussels from the Cantabrian Sea (North Spain). Mar. Pollut. Bull. 62 948-955. 

Karrman, A., Domingo, J. L., Llebaria, X., Nadal, M., Bigas, E., van Bavel, B., and Lindstrom, G. 2010. Biomonitoring perfluorinated compounds in Catalonia, Spain Concentrations and trends in human liver and milk samples. Environ. ScL Pollut. Res. 17 750-758. 

Perfluorinated organic compounds constitute a unique class of POP. They occur as completely fluorinated hydrocarbon derivatives, such as CF4, in the atmosphere, where they are regarded as atmospheric pollutants and potential greenhouse gases (see Chapter 7). Other perfluorinated compounds that are organic acids or their salts have been encountered as water pollutants. Most commonly cited are salts of perfluorooctane sulfonic acid others include salts of perfluorinated carboxylic acids, such as perfluorohexanoic acid ... 

Moriwaki H. Liquid chromatographic-mass spectrometric methods for the analysis of persistent pollutants polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, organochlorine compounds and perfluorinated compounds. Curr Orga Chem 2005 9(9) 849—57. 

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