OBJECTIVE A growing body of evidence suggests that environmental pollutants, such as heavy metals, persistent organic pollutants and plasticizers play an important role in the development of chronic diseases. Most epidemiologic studies have examined environmental pollutants individually, but in real life, we are exposed to multi-pollutants and pollution mixtures, not single pollutants. Although...

A nonlinear five-dimensional mathematical model is proposed and analyzed to study the removal of a gaseous pollutant and two different particulate matters by rain from the atmosphere of a city. The atmosphere, during rain, is assumed to consist of five interacting phases namely, the raindrops phase, the gaseous pollutant phase, its absorbed phase and the phases of two different particulate matt...

The evaluation of pollutant levels is a key aspect on the issue of keeping a clean environment. Conventional techniques include the utilisation of a xed setup incorporating pollutant sensors. However, these approaches are a very long way from an accurate monitoring. Thus, to improve pollutant monitoring on a power plant chimney, the use of robotic agent societies (mobile robots) is suggested. T...

AIM To investigate the acute health effects of winter outdoor air pollution (nitrogen dioxide (NO(2)), ozone (O(3)), sulphur dioxide (SO(2)), sulphate (SO(4)(2-)),and particles (PM(10))) on schoolchildren in an area of southern England where levels of SO(2) had been reported to be high. METHODS A total of 179 children, aged 7-13, from three schools (two urban and one rural location), were inc...

2,4,6-trichlorophenol (2,4,6-TCP) is a hazardous pollutant that is efficiently degraded by some aerobic soil bacterial isolates under laboratory conditions. The degradation of this pollutant in soils and its effect on the soil microbial community are poorly understood. We report here the ability of a previously unexposed forest soil microbiota to degrade high levels of 2,4,6-TCP and describe th...

BACKGROUND There is growing evidence suggesting an association between air pollution and suicide. However, previous findings varied depending on the type of air pollutant and study location. OBJECTIVES We examined the association between air pollutants and suicide in 10 large cities in South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan. METHODS We used a two-stage meta-analysis. First, we conducted a time-stra...

PCDD/F and PCB concentrations in remote mountainous spruce stands of the Central European Alps show strong geographic variation. Independent of the matrix (0.5 year old needles, humus or mineral soil), the highest pollutant levels were always found at the lateral zones of the mountain range. High levels coincided with strong precipitation, particularly along the northern margin of the study reg...

A critical component for predictions of formation of ozone and other secondary pollutant formation in the atmosphere is the chemical mechanism, i.e., the portion of the airshed models used to represent the chemical reactions involved. This is because the chemistry is the source of much of the complexity and non-linearity involved. Because many of the chemical reactions are incompletely understo...

Although persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic pollutants (PBTs) are well-studied individually, their distribution and variability on a global scale are largely unknown, particularly in marine fish. Using 2,662 measurements collected from peer-reviewed literature spanning 1969-2012, we examined variability of five classes of PBTs, considering effects of geography, habitat, and trophic level on ...