Biomonitoring of pesticides by pine needles--chemical scoring, risk of exposure, levels and trends.
Vegetation is a useful matrix for the quantification of atmospheric pollutants such as semi-volatile organic compounds (SVOCs). In particular, pine needles stand out as effective biomonitors due to the excellent uptake properties of their waxy layer. Having previously validated an original and reliable method to analyse pesticides in pine needles, our work team set the objective of this study to determine the levels of 18 pesticides in Pinus pinea needles collected in 12 different sampling sites in Portugal. These compounds were selected among a total of 70 pesticides by previous chemical scoring, developed to assess their probability to occur in the atmosphere. The risk of exposure was evaluated by the binomial chemical score/frequency of occurrence in the analysed samples. Levels and trends of the chemical families and target of the pesticides were obtained regarding the type of land occupation of the selected sites, including the use of advanced statistics (principal component analysis, PCA). Finally, some correlations with several characteristics of the sampling sites (population, energy consumption, meteorology, etc.) were also investigated.
University of Murcia, Physics of the Earth, Campus de Espinardo, 30100 Murcia, Spain; LEPABE - Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal. Electronic address: nrneto@um.es.
Nuno
N
Ratola
LEPABE - Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal.
Vera
V
Homem
LEPABE - Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal.
José Avelino
JA
Silva
LEPABE - Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal.
Rita
R
Araújo
Department of Food Science, Spectroscopy and Chemometrics, Faculty of Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Rolighedsvej 30, DK-1958 Frederiksberg C, Denmark.
José Manuel
JM
Amigo
LEPABE - Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal.
Lúcia
L
Santos
LEPABE - Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal.
Arminda
A
Alves
D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000032:analysis*; D000397:Air Pollution / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000379:methods*; D010575:Pesticides / Q000032:analysis*; D028223:Pinus / Q000737:chemistry*; D018515:Plant Leaves / Q000737:chemistry*; D011174:Portugal; D025341:Principal Component Analysis; D018570:Risk Assessment
D000393:Air Pollutants; D010575:Pesticides
Biomonitoring; Chemical scoring; Pesticides; Pine needles; Risk of exposure