Source identification of PCBs in Antarctic air by compound-specific isotope analysis of chlorine (CSIA-Cl) using HRGC/HRMS

Abstract

Occurrence of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) in the Polar Regions has received great concern in the past several decades due to their long-term adverse effect on biological health in such a fragile environment. However, there is still argument over their source and fate in these pristine areas. Here we attempted to use a novel approach (compound-specific isotope analysis of chlorine, CSIA-Cl) to identify the source of POPs in Antarctic air by comparison with the source area. The results showed that the relative isotope-ratio variation of Cl (δ37Cl′) values showed a large variation from − 137 to 9.04 ‰ in the gas-phase samples, and a significantly negative correlation (p < 0.01) was obtained against the logKoa values of PCBs. There were no significant correlations (p > 0.05) observed between the δ37Cl′ values and meteorological parameters except for PCB-28 which showed temperature dependence. By contrast, the δ37Cl′ values in the urban (Beijing) air ranged from − 12.8 to 2.03 ‰. The larger variation of δ37Cl′ in Antarctic air indicated evidently influence of long-range atmospheric transport (LRAT) on isotopologue fractionation of PCBs. This study may shed light on the application of CSIA-Cl for source identification of chlorinated POPs on a large scale.