Exposure Level, Toxicity Effects and Health Risk Assessment of Organophosphorus Flame Retardants in Water Environment

Organophosphorus flame retardants(OPFRs) are gradually replacing brominated flame retardants(BFRs), which are widely used in the world. The increasing output of OPFRs and the increasing detection of OPFRs in environmental media have attracted wide attention of scholars at home and abroad. OPFRs are generally semi-volatile, easy to enter the environment and accumulate in organisms,causing potential hazards to the environment and human health. In this paper, the pollution status and toxic effects of OPFRs in aquatic environment were introduced,and the research progress of human health risk caused by them was summarized.The existing problems were pointed out, and the future research was prospected. In the future, the analytical methods of various environmental and biological media should be improved, and comprehensive and in-depth environmental investigation and ecological and health risk assessment should be carried out. Attention should be paid to the effects of combined pollution on organisms and the study of biological acceptability.

Degradation and detoxification mechanisms of organophosphorus flame retardant tris(1,3-dichloro-2-propyl)phosphate(TDCPP)during electrochemical oxidation process

Electrochemical oxidation of aqueous tris(1,3-dichloro-2-propyl)phosphate(TDCPP)by using Ti/SnO_(2)-Sb/La-PbO_(2)as anode was investigated for the first time,and the degradation mechanisms and toxicity changes of the degradation intermediates were further determined.Results suggested that electrochemical degradation of TDCPP followed pseudo-first-order kinetics,and the reaction rate constant(k)was 0.0332 min^(−1)at the applied current density of 10 mA/cm^(2)and Na_(2)SO_(4)concentration of 10 mmol/L.There was better TDCPP degradation performance at higher current density.Free hydroxy radical(•OH)was proved to play dominant role in TDCPP oxidation via quenching experiment,with a relative contribution rate of 60.1%.A total of five intermediates(M1,C_(6)H_(11)Cl_(4)O_(4)P;M2,C_(3)H_(7)Cl_(2)O_(4)P;M3,C_(9)H_(16)Cl_(5)O_(5)P;M4,C_(9)H_(14)Cl_(5)O_(6)P;M5,C_(6)H_(10)Cl_(3)O_(6)P)were identified,and the intermediates were further degraded prolonging with the reaction time.Flow cytometer results suggested that the toxicity of TDCPP and degradation intermediates significantly reduced,and the detoxification efficiency was achieved at 78.1%at 180 min.ECOSAR predictive model was used to assess the relative toxicity of TDCPP and the degradation intermediates.The EC_(50)to green algae was 3.59 mg/L for TDCPP,and the values raised to 84,574,54.6,391,and 8920 mg/L for M1,M2,M3,M4,and M5,respectively,indicating that the degradation intermediates are less toxic or not toxic.Electrochemical advanced oxidation process is a valid technology to degrade TDCPP and pose a good detoxification effect.