BIOMAGNIFICATION ASSESSMENT OF CONCENTRATIONS. CASE STUDY USING PERFLUOROOCTANE SULFONATE (PFOS)

摘要

Polyfluoralkyl compounds (PFCs) have recently received particular interest during last years due to their hazard characteristics. Unfortunately, scarce information is available for understanding their transportation, environmental fate and final sinks or loss mechanisms. This work therefore attempts to asses the relationship between PFOS levels found in biota and the trends in production volumes. For such proposal, a literature review on PFOS temporal trend was performed and the data collected was grouped by trophic categories. The results suggest different relationships between the trends in PFOS production volume and concentrations in biota from remote areas; depending mostly on the trophic status of the organisms. Factors such as the longevity of the organisms and the accumulation mechanisms of PFOS, where seasonal and reproductive conditions do not play the same role than for lipophylic POPs, could explain these finding which are essential for the long-term risk assessment. In addition, simplified models were used in this study for predicting water exposure levels from measurements in biota, resulting in estimations close to the reported measured concentration in the literature. As suggest these results, the levels found in biota can be used as a guide for understanding the fate of PFOS in the environment.