Eco-toxicology and its

Environmental Significance
Dr. Viralkumar Vinodchandra Surati
 Introduction
• The term “Eco-toxicology” was
introduced by Truhaut in 1969. Ecotoxicology

• It is study of the fate and effect of

toxic substances on an
Ecosystem. Eco toxicology

• Its emphasis is more at the

population, community, and
ecosystem levels
Toxic chemicals present in Environment

Pesticides
Mycotoxins

Toxic
Volatile chemicals Heavy
organic metals
compounds

Plasticisers
CHEMICAL MOVEMENT, FATE,
AND EXPOSURE
• To characterize chemical behavior, it is necessary to
• measure the chemical in different environmental
compartments (e.g., air, soil, water, and biological systems),

• understand the movement and transport of the chemical

within and among these compartments, and

• follow the chemical as it is metabolized, degraded, stored,

or concentrated within each compartment
Chemodynamics
• Chemical transport occurs both within environmental
compartments (intraphase) and between them (interphase).

• Chemodynamics is the study of chemical release, distribution,

degradation, and fate in the environment.
Single-Phase Chemical Behavior
• Once a synthetic chemical enters the environment, it is acted
upon primarily by natural forces like
• temperature, wind and water-flow directions and velocities, incident
solar radiation, atmospheric pressure and humidity.

• Intraphase movement consists of

• mass transfer,
• diffusion, or
• dispersion within a single phase.
• Contaminant persistence is a function of the stability of
chemical in a phase.

• Stability is a function of the physicochemical properties of

a particular chemical and the kinetics of its degradation
in the phase.
Air
• The primary routes of contaminant
entry into the atmosphere are
through
• evaporation,
• stack emissions, and
• other matrices.
• Contaminant transport in air generally occurs much more
rapidly than in the hydrosphere, as air has lower viscosity.

• Contaminant transport in air occurs primarily by diffusional

processes or advection.

• The contaminant diffusivity in air depends on

• its molecular weight compared to air,
• air temperature,
• the molecular separation at collision,
• the energy of molecular interaction, and
• Boltzmann's constant.
• Atmospheric stability
affects the amount of
turbulence and thus the
degree of vertical mixing in
the atmosphere.

• The stability of the

atmosphere is considered
neutral when the convective
forces-heat transfer from
warm ground surfaces and
radiative cooling from the top
of the cloud layer-are equal.
• Vertical mixing is at a maximum when heat transfer is greater
than radiative cooling and at a minimum during inversion
conditions.

• Vertical mixing can trap higher concentrations of

contaminants near the earth's surface.
Water
• Contaminants enter the hydrosphere by
• direct application,
• spills,
• wet and dry deposition, and
• interphase movement.

• Chemical movement in the hydrosphere occurs through

• diffusion,
• dispersion, and bulk flow of the water.
• Contaminant movement in a water, is dominated by the
turbulence of the water.

• If the water is stagnant, (e.g., in close proximity to a stationary

phase such as soil or an artificial boundary), the chemical moves
by molecular diffusion.
• The diffusion rate depends on fixed characteristics such as
• the molecular weight of the contaminant (solute),
• the molecular weight of the water (solvent),
• water temperature,
• viscosity, and
• the association factor for water and
• dynamic characteristics such as the magnitude of the concentration gradient
of the contaminant.

• These characteristics are referred to as the diffusivity of the

contaminant-water mixture.

• Diffusional processes in water are several orders of magnitude faster

than in soil.
• Away from the boundaries of other media (i.e,, air and soil),
transport in water is dominated by turbulence.

• Even in seemingly still water, water is constantly moving in

vertical and horizontal eddies.

• These eddies are small pockets of water that form and subside
and transport the contaminant. This mode of transport is defined
as eddy diffusion.
• In addition, the contaminant can be rapidly transported by
bulk flow (also referred to as advection) in the cases of
streams and rivers.

• In advection, the rate of transport is proportional to stream

velocity.
Soil
• Soils have varying porosities due to their composition (percent
sand, silt, clay, organic matter).

• But pores are invariably filled with either gas or fluids.

• Chemical movement in the soil occurs by diffusion in these

fluids or by the movement of water through the voids between
soil particles.
• Fluid-borne contaminants
partition with the solid fraction of
soil by processes closely resembling
chromatography, in that
• chemical solubility in pore water,
• adsorption to soil particles, and
• pore-water velocity affect the rate of
transport (Willard et al., 1988).

• The direction of diffusion will be

from areas of high to areas of low
concentration.
• The chemical diffusion rate in soil depends on
• molecular weight,
• soil temperature,
• the length of the path, and
• the magnitude of the concentration gradient (Shonnard et al., 1993).

• Contaminants leave the soil by interphase transport or

decomposition.

• Transformation of contaminants (as through microbial degradation)

can be significant in soil due to the density and diversity of
microorganisms in this compartment compared with water and air.
 Chemical transport between phases
• Once release, a chemical can enter any of the four matrices:
• the atmosphere by evaporation,
• the lithosphere by adsorption,
• the hydrosphere by dissolution, or
• the biosphere by absorption, inhalation, or ingestion (depending on the
species).

• Once in a matrix, the contaminant can enter another matrix by

interphase transport.
 Air-water
• A chemical can leave the water by volatilization.

• Conversely, an airborne contaminant can move into an aqueous

phase by absorption.

• At equilibrium, the net rates of volatilization and absorption are

equal and the total mass transfer of the contaminant is zero.
• In non-equilibrium conditions, the rate of net movement
of a chemical from one phase to another depends on
• how far the system is away from equilibrium as well
as
• the magnitude of the overall mass transfer coefficient
(Mackay, 1991).

• Mass transfer coefficient depends on

• the physical properties of the solute (such as vapor
pressure and solubility) and
• the magnitude of the bulk flow of both the air and the
water.
Soil-water
• A contaminant can leave the soil and enter the water through
the process of desorption.

• Water-borne contaminants can also adsorb on soil particles.

• Again, the rate of mass transfer depends on
• the contaminant-specific overall mass transfer coefficient,
• the bulk flow velocity of the water over the water-soil interface,
and
• physicochemical properties of the soil, such as particle size
distribution and organic matter content.

• Partitioning of contaminants from water to soil or sediment is

one of the key processes controlling exposure.
 Soil-air
• A contaminant may leave the soil and be transported into the
overlying air through the process of volatilization.

• This process is dependent on the vapor pressure of the chemical

and its affinity for the soil.

• Environmental processes that affect the thickness of the soil-air

boundary layer (i.e., wind velocity) or contaminant sorption
(i.e., soil moisture content), in turn, influence movement from
soil to air.
 Chemical Behavior and Bioavailability
• It is necessary to understand how physicochemical properties
influence contaminant behaviour.

• Ultimately, the goal is to assess the potential

• bioconcentration (uptake of contaminants from the external
environment),
• bioaccumulation (uptake of contaminants from the external
environment and food), and
• Biomagnification (increasing contaminant concentrations at higher
trophic levels) in organisms.
• In the environment, only a portion of the total quantity of
chemical present is potentially available for uptake by
organisms. This concept is referred to as the biological
availability (or bioavailability) of a chemical.

• Chemical bioavailability in various environmental

compartments ultimately dictates toxicity.
Thank you