Abstract
Pharmaceuticals have been detected in the soil environment where there is the potential for uptake into crops. This study explored the fate and uptake of pharmaceuticals (carbamazepine, diclofenac, fluoxetine, propranolol, sulfamethazine) and a personal care product (triclosan) in soil–plant systems using radish (Raphanus sativus) and ryegrass (Lolium perenne). Five of the six chemicals were detected in plant tissue. Carbamazepine was taken up to the greatest extent in both the radish (52 μg/g) and ryegrass (33 μg/g), whereas sulfamethazine uptake was below the limit of quantitation (LOQ) (<0.01 μg/g). In the soil, concentrations of diclofenac and sulfamethazine dropped below the LOQ after 7 days. However, all pharmaceuticals were still detectable in the pore water at the end of the experiment. The results demonstrate the ability of plant species to accumulate pharmaceuticals from soils with uptake apparently specific to both plant species and chemical. Results can be partly explained by the hydrophobicity and extent of ionization of each chemical in the soil.
Highlights
Worldwide, pharmaceutical use has been on the increase for the past century[1−3] and will continue to increase into the future with the development of new medicines to cure recently discovered diseases as well as previously untreatable conditions
They are typically transported to a wastewater treatment works, where, depending on their molecular structure and physicochemical properties, they can be either degraded by biological treatment processes or released to the environment in effluents or sorb to sludge.[4−8] The soil environment will be exposed to active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and their metabolites when sludge from treatment processes is applied to land as an agricultural fertilizer or when soil is irrigated with reclaimed wastewater effluent.[9−13] While only a few studies have explored the occurrence of APIs in the soil environment, available data indicate that a range of API classes, including nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs, antidepressants, anticonvulsants, and antibacterial agents do occur in soils in concentrations up to the low mg/kg level.[9−15]
Some of the study compounds persisted in the soil throughout the 40 day uptake period, while others were readily dissipated (Figure 2; Table 3)
Summary
Pharmaceutical use has been on the increase for the past century[1−3] and will continue to increase into the future with the development of new medicines to cure recently discovered diseases as well as previously untreatable conditions. Measured concentrations for each of the pharmaceuticals taken up by the radish and ryegrass were used to calculate soil and pore water-based uptake factors (UFs).
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