Effective Modeling Framework for Quantifying the Potential Impacts of Coexisting Anions on the Toxicity of Arsenate, Selenite, and Vanadate
Environmental Science & Technology, vol. 54, pp. 2379–2388
Abstract
Hardly any study has focused on the quantitative modeling of the toxicity of anionic metal(loid)s and their mixtures in the presence of potentially competing anions. Here, we designed a univariate experiment (420 treatments) to investigate the influence of various anions (phosphate, sulfate, carbonate, and OH – ) on the toxicity of single anionic metal(loid)s (arsenate, selenite, and vanadate) and a full factorial mixture experiment (196 treatments) to examine the interactions and toxicity of As–Se mixtures at 4 phosphate levels. Standard root elongation tests with wheat ( Triticum aestivum ) were performed. A modeling framework, resembling the biotic ligand model (BLM) for cationic metals, was developed, extended, and applied to explain anion competitions and mixture effects. Carbonate significantly alleviated the toxicity of all three metal(loid)s. The toxicity of As was significantly mitigated by phosphate, while V toxicity was significantly relieved by OH – . The BLM-like model successfully explained more than 93% of the observed variance in toxicity. With the parameters derived from single-metal(loid) exposures, the developed BLM-toxic unit model reached an overall prediction performance of 78% in modeling the toxicity of As–Se mixtures at varying phosphate levels, validating the effectiveness of the model framework. It is concluded that by taking possible anion competitions and interactions into account, the BLM-type approaches can serve as promising tools for the risk assessment of single and mixed metal(loid)s contamination.
Authors 6
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Affiliation as printed
School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China
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Affiliation as printed
School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
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Hao Qiu corresponding
Sun Yat-sen University · Shanghai Jiao Tong University · Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Environmental Pollution Control and Remediation Technology
Affiliation as printed
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Environmental Pollution Control and Remediation Technology, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China
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Leiden University · National Institute for Public Health and the Environment
Affiliation as printed
Center for the Safety of Substances and Products, National Institute of Public Health and the Environment, Bilthoven 3720 BA, The Netherlands
Institute of Environmental Sciences, Leiden University, Leiden 2333CC, The Netherlands
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Affiliation as printed
Department of Ecological Science, Faculty of Science, Vrije Universiteit, De Boelelaan 1085, Amsterdam 1081 HV, The Netherlands
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Affiliation as printed
School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China
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