Affiliations 

  • 1 United Arab Emirates University, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Street, Al-Ain 15551, United Arab Emirates
  • 2 United Arab Emirates University, Department of Integrative Agriculture, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Street, Al-Ain 15551, United Arab Emirates
  • 3 Medcare Hospital, Department of Pediatrics and Neonatology, King Faisal Street, Sharjah 15551, United Arab Emirates
  • 4 Department of Chemical Engineering, Sustainable Process Engineering Centre (SPEC), Universiti Malaya, Kuala Lumpur 50603, Malaysia
  • 5 United Arab Emirates University, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Street, Al-Ain 15551, United Arab Emirates. Electronic address: mn.altarawneh@uaeu.ac.ae
Ecotoxicol Environ Saf, 2024 Nov 01;286:117196.
PMID: 39426109 DOI: 10.1016/j.ecoenv.2024.117196

Abstract

Halogenated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (HPAHs, H = F, Cl, Br) are a new class of PAHs derivatives that mainly originate from the incomplete combustion of halogen-laden materials and via metallurgical operations. These compounds circulate extensively in various environmental matrices. This survey provides a comprehensive review on governing synthesis routes of HPAHs, their environmental occurrence, and their health and ecological effects. The review comprehensively enlists and presents emission sources of these emerging organic pollutants into the air that serves as their main reservoir. The formation of HPAHs ensues through successive addition reactions of related precursors accompanied by ring cyclization steps; in addition to direct unimolecular fragmentation of parents halogenated. Halogenation of parent PAHs rapidly occurs in saline ecosystems, thus multiplying the availability of these notorious compounds in the environment. Certain HPAHs appear to be more carcinogenic than dioxins. Transmission routes of HPAHs from their emission sources to water bodies, soil, aquatic life, plants, terrestrial animals, and humans are well-documented. Later, the direct and indirect diffusion of HPAHs from air to the biotic (plants, animals, humans) and abiotic components (soil, water, sediments) are described in detail. The study concludes that HPAHs are permeable to the carbon matrices resulting in the alleviation of the source-to-sink interface. As a potential future perspective, understanding the transmission interfaces lays a foundation to intervene in the introduction of these toxicants into the food chain.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.