Demeestere, K.

Huysman, S.

Van Langenhove, H.

Van Meulebroek, L.

Vanhaecke, L.

Vanryckeghem, F.

Open Marine Archive

 15 
Have plasticizers already reached our marine environment? 
Huysman Steve
1
, Van Meulebroek Lieven
1
, Vanryckeghem Francis
2
, Van Langenhove Herman
2
, 
Demeestere Kristof
2
 and Vanhaecke Lynn
2
 
1 
Department of Veterinary Public Health and Food Safety, Laboratory of Chemical Analysis (LCA), 
Salisburylaan 133, Merelbeke, Belgium 
 E-mail: steve.huysman@ugent.be 
2
 Department of Green Chemistry and Technology, Research Group Environmental Organic 
Chemistry and Technology (EnVOC), Coupure links 653, Ghent, Belgium 
 
Yearly, 4.8 to 12.7 million tons of plastic waste enter our oceans and this amount is expected to 
increase by an order of magnitude by 2025 [1,2]. As a result of this widespread global contamination, 
plasticizers can extensively enter our aquatic ecosystem [3]. Furthermore, the abundance of 
plasticizers has recently prompted significant public and mass media interest due to severe known 
and unknown adverse ecological effects [4,5]. 
 
Therefore, this study engaged in the analysis of plasticizers in seawater samples dispersed in the 
Belgian Part of the North Sea (4 locations) during different seasons (2016-2017). The seawater 
samples were analyzed using an in-house developed and validated ultra-high-performance liquid 
chromatographic high-resolution mass spectrometric (UHPLC-HRMS) platform (Huysman et. Al, 2018, 
submitted in journal of Analytical Chemistry). This platform covered 3 different approaches, i.e. 
targeted, suspected and untargeted analysis. The targeted analysis aims at the quantification of a 
predefined list of 27 common plasticizers. Following this targeted analysis, 16 plasticizers were 
ubiquitously detected with concentrations ranging from 20 to 8000 ng L
-1
. Different conjugates (i.e. 
transformation and degradation products) of the target plasticizers were screened during suspected 
analysis based on an in-house database (n=289), thereby using information about the accurate mass, 
isotopic profile and fragmentation spectrum. As a result, 6 additional suspected plasticizers were 
identified. Subsequently, untargeted analysis revealed 420 different unknown compounds including 
9 with a backbone structure related to the target plasticizers as being verified based on characteristic 
product ions and neutral loss fragments. 
 
In conclusion, our work suggests that different known, suspected and unknown plasticizers have 
reached our aquatic ecosystem and may contribute to adverse ecological effects threatening the 
aquatic ecosystem. Moreover, plasticizers are recently recognized as sensitive biomarkers for 
obtaining epidemiological information [6], which can now be evaluated by our newly developed 
platform. Finally, this work also stresses the urgency of investigating the unknown potential effects 
of plasticizers in the marine environment. 
 
References 
 
[1] J.R. Jambeck, Plastic waste inputs from land into the ocean, Clim. Chang. 2014 Impacts, Adapt. 
Vulnerability. 347 (2015) 1655–1732. doi:10.1017/CBO9781107415386.010. 
[2] Erik, Sebille, Environmental Research Letters A global inventory of small floating plastic debris, 
Environ. Res. Lett. 10 (2015). http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-
9326/10/12/124006/pdf (accessed November 23, 2017). 
[3] Lind, Circulating Levels of Phthalate Metabolites Are Associated With Prevalent Diabetes in the 
Elderly, 35 (2012) 1519–1524. doi:10.2337/dc11-2396. 
[4] L. Canesi, E. Fabbri, Environmental effects of BPA: Focus on aquatic species, Dose-Response. 13 
(2015) 155932581559830. doi:10.1177/1559325815598304. 
[5] C. Guerranti, E. Grazioli, S. Focardi, M. Renzi, G. Perra, Levels of chemicals in two fish species 
from four Italian fishing areas, Mar. Pollut. Bull. 111 (2016) 449–452. 
doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2016.07.002. 
[6] E. Gracia-Lor, S. Castiglioni, R. Bade, F. Been, E. Castrignanò, A. Covaci, et al., Measuring 
biomarkers in wastewater as a new source of epidemiological information: Current state and 
future perspectives, Environ. Int. 99 (2017) 131–150. doi:10.1016/j.envint.2016.12.016. 
 
Keywords: plasticizers; Belgian Part of the North Sea; screening; UHPLC-HRMS  


Have plasticizers already reached our marine environment?

http://www.vliz.be/imisdocs/publications/311691.pdf

Have plasticizers already reached our marine environment?

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Open Marine Archive