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Biomonitoring of emerging PFAS in wildlife and domestic animals in North Carolina
Citation:
Bangma, J., A. Robuck, S. Pu, J. Boettger, J. McCord, J. Sobus, T. Guillette, K. Rock, AND S. Belcher. Biomonitoring of emerging PFAS in wildlife and domestic animals in North Carolina. 2023 SETAC North America Annual Meeting, Louisville, KY, November 12 - 16, 2023.
Impact/Purpose:
The purpose of this study was to investigate banked wildlife data from the Cape Fear Region of North Carolina for additional emerging PFAS previously not investigated for in previous published analyses.
Description:
Over the last decade, applications of non-target analysis (NTA) for environmental monitoring have detected dozens of novel PFAS in the Cape Fear Region (CFR) of North Carolina including GenX (HFPO-DA), Nafion byproduct 2 (BP2), and perfluoroether carboxylic acids with four (PFO4DA) or five (PFO5DA) ether linkages. Many of these compounds were first identified in surface water and then subsequently detected in biota. Detection of these novel PFAS in humans prompted the first toxicological investigations, which identified significant adverse health effects at elevated exposure levels. However, three findings from CFR monitoring have led our lab to reanalyze banked blood and tissue samples for additional novel PFAS. First, although PFO5DA was nearly below the method reporting limit in previously investigated surface water, the compound was determined to have one of the highest bioaccumulation rates in a recent bioaccumulation study.1 Second, the same bioaccumulation study identified the novel PFAS Nafion by-product 6 (BP6) in both surface water and dosed rodent tissues. Lastly, a reanalysis of wildlife NTA data revealed suspect peaks of three novel PFAS that showed evidence of belonging to the PFO5DA homologous series (PFO6, PFO7 and PFO8) but have not been observed in surface water. As a result, our lab sought to determine concentrations of these additional novel PFAS by reanalyzing banked wildlife and domestic animal blood and tissue samples from the CFR (horse, dog, alligator, fish, and seabirds). Both Nafion BP6 and PFO6 were quantitated using matching available standards while concentrations of PFO7 and PFO8 were estimated using semi-quantitative NTA methodologies. Results show that none of the four PFAS were observed above method reporting limits in horse and dog serum; however, PFO6, PFO7, and PFO8 were observed at varying frequencies and concentrations in alligator, fish, and seabird tissues from the region. These results show that PFAS found in surface water near or below method detection limits may be a concern for bioaccumulation in biota. Further investigations into the toxicological impacts of these new perfluoroethers are warranted.
