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Emerging Industrial Pollutants in Wastewater: Occurrence, Environmental Fate, Toxicological Mechanisms and Treatment Strategies
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This review summarizes existing research on pollutants found in wastewater, including pharmaceuticals, PFAS, microplastics, and other industrial chemicals. It covers how these substances occur, spread, and affect microorganisms, wildlife, and humans, along with methods for detecting and treating them. The authors note gaps remain in understanding long-term risks and effects of mixtures.
With the accelerated industrialization, the emission of emerging pollutants has increased in aquatic systems, which poses a risk to the integrity of ecosystems, water security and human health. Examples include pharmaceuticals, PFAS, endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), synthetic dyes, industrial solvents, microplastics, engineered nanomaterials (ENMs), antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs), and persistent organic pollutants (POPs), all of which are persistent, mobile, bioaccumulating, and have complex toxicity. Their industrial emissions, environmental presence, fate, and mechanism of toxicity are discussed in this review to microorganisms, aquatic organisms, wildlife, and humans. It represents a critical evaluation of the developments in high-resolution mass spectrometry, molecular methods and biosensors, chemometrics, and artificial intelligence for monitoring. The physical, chemical, biological, and hybrid treatment methods (adsorption, membrane filtration, advanced oxidation, electrochemical oxidation, bioremediation, microalgal systems, biochar, and nanotechnology) are discussed. There has been some progress, but gaps remain in the knowledge on environmental fate, environmental transformations, mixture effects, and long-term risk. Future research should be directed towards real-time monitoring and mechanistic toxicity evaluation, predictive modeling, integrated treatment, resource recovery, and sustainable environmental management.
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This review covers emerging contaminants in water including pharmaceuticals, PFAS, microplastics, and nanomaterials that escape conventional water treatment and persist in the environment. It evaluates advanced detection techniques and newer treatment methods such as membrane filtration, advanced oxidation, and bioremediation to address these pollutants that pose ongoing risks to public health.
Occurrence, bioaccumulation, fate, and risk assessment of emerging pollutants in aquatic environments: A review
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This review summarizes research on five types of emerging pollutants in water, including microplastics, pharmaceuticals, fluorinated chemicals (PFAS), flame retardants, and disinfection byproducts. Wastewater treatment plants are the main source of these pollutants entering waterways, and microplastics along with PFAS and flame retardants can travel long distances and build up in living organisms. While ecological risk was generally assessed as low in most locations, the review highlights gaps in monitoring and the need for better prediction tools to protect water supplies and human health.
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