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A Review on the Abundance, Distribution and Eco-Biological Risks of PAHs in the Key Environmental Matrices of South Asia

  • Chapter
Reviews of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology Volume 240

Part of the book series: Reviews of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology ((RECT,volume 240))

Abstract

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are consistently posing high risks to human/biota in developing countries of South Asia where domestic areas are exposed to biomass burning and commercial/industrial activities. This review article summarized the available data on PAHs occurrence, distribution, potential sources and their possible risks in the key environmental matrices (i.e., Air, Soil/Sediments, Water) from South Asian Region (SAR). Available literature reviewed suggested that PAHs concentration levels were strongly influenced by the monsoonal rainfall system in the region and it has been supported by many studies that higher concentrations were measured during the winter season as compared to summer. Biomass burning (household and brick kilns activities), open burning of solid wastes and industrial and vehicular emissions were categorized as major sources of PAHs in the region. Regional comparison revealed that the contamination levels of PAHs in the water bodies and soil/sediments in SAR remained higher relatively to the reports from other regions of the world. Our findings highlight that there is still a general lack of reliable data, inventories and research studies addressing PAHs related issues in the context of environmental and human health in SAR. There is therefore a critical need to improve the current knowledge base, which should build upon the research experience from other regions which have experienced similar situations in the past. Further research into these issues in South Asia is considered vital to help inform future policies/control strategies as already successfully implemented in other countries.

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Acknowledgments

JH Syed is highly thankful to Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) for PIFI (2015PE029). This work was supported by the NSFC (41550110225).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no competing financial interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Environmental Biology and Ecotoxicology Laboratory, Department of Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-I-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan

    Naima Hamid, Atif Kamal, Faiqa Aziz, Sundas Tanveer, Usman Ali & Riffat Naseem Malik

  2. State Key Laboratory of Organic Geochemistry, Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou, 510640, China

    Jabir Hussain Syed, Ishwar Chandra Yadav, Jun Li & Gan Zhang

  3. Department of Chemistry “Ugo Schiff”, University of Florence, Via della Lastruccia, 3, 50019, Sesto Fiorentino, Florence, Italy

    Alessandra Cincinelli

  4. CNR, Istituto per la Dinamica dei Processi Ambientali, Via Dorsoduro 2137, 30123, Venezia, Italy

    Alessandra Cincinelli

  5. Norwegian Institute for Air Research (NILU) – FRAM High North Research Centre on Climate and the Environment, Hjalmar Johansens gt. 14 NO, 9296, Tromsø, Norway

    Athanasios Katsoyiannis

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  1. Naima Hamid
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  9. Ishwar Chandra Yadav
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  10. Jun Li
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  11. Riffat Naseem Malik
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  12. Gan Zhang
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Jabir Hussain Syed or Riffat Naseem Malik .

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  1. University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Pim de Voogt

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Hamid, N. et al. (2016). A Review on the Abundance, Distribution and Eco-Biological Risks of PAHs in the Key Environmental Matrices of South Asia. In: de Voogt, P. (eds) Reviews of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology Volume 240. Reviews of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology, vol 240. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/398_2015_5007

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