Item


Hidden drivers of low-dose pharmaceutical pollutant mixtures revealed by the novel GSA-QHTS screening method

The ecological impacts of emerging pollutants such as pharmaceuticals are not well understood. The lack of experimental approaches for the identification of pollutant effects in realistic settings (that is, low doses, complex mixtures, and variable environmental conditions) supports the widespread perception that these effects are often unpredictable. To address this, we developed a novel screening method (GSA-QHTS) that couples the computational power of global sensitivity analysis (GSA) with the experimental efficiency of quantitative high-throughput screening (QHTS). We present a case study where GSA-QHTS allowed for the identification of the main pharmaceutical pollutants (and their interactions), driving biological effects of low-dose complex mixtures at the microbial population level. The QHTS experiments involved the integrated analysis of nearly 2700 observations from an array of 180 unique low-dose mixtures, representing the most complex and data-rich experimental mixture effect assessment of main pharmaceutical pollutants to date. An ecological scaling-up experiment confirmed that this subset of pollutants also affects typical freshwater microbial community assemblages. Contrary to our expectations and challenging established scientific opinion, the bioactivity of the mixtures was not predicted by the null mixture models, and the main drivers that were identified by GSA-QHTS were overlooked by the current effect assessment scheme. Our results suggest that current chemical effect assessment methods overlook a substantial number of ecologically dangerous chemical pollutants and introduce a new operational framework for their systematic identification

Science Advances, 2016, núm. 2, p. e1601272

American Association for the Advancement of Science

Author: Rodea Palomares, Ismael
Gonzalez Pleiter, Miguel
Gonzalo, Soledad
Rosal, Roberto
Leganés, Francisco
Sabater, Sergi
Casellas, Maria
Muñoz Carpena, Rafael
Fernández Piñas, Francisca
Date: 2016 September 7
Abstract: The ecological impacts of emerging pollutants such as pharmaceuticals are not well understood. The lack of experimental approaches for the identification of pollutant effects in realistic settings (that is, low doses, complex mixtures, and variable environmental conditions) supports the widespread perception that these effects are often unpredictable. To address this, we developed a novel screening method (GSA-QHTS) that couples the computational power of global sensitivity analysis (GSA) with the experimental efficiency of quantitative high-throughput screening (QHTS). We present a case study where GSA-QHTS allowed for the identification of the main pharmaceutical pollutants (and their interactions), driving biological effects of low-dose complex mixtures at the microbial population level. The QHTS experiments involved the integrated analysis of nearly 2700 observations from an array of 180 unique low-dose mixtures, representing the most complex and data-rich experimental mixture effect assessment of main pharmaceutical pollutants to date. An ecological scaling-up experiment confirmed that this subset of pollutants also affects typical freshwater microbial community assemblages. Contrary to our expectations and challenging established scientific opinion, the bioactivity of the mixtures was not predicted by the null mixture models, and the main drivers that were identified by GSA-QHTS were overlooked by the current effect assessment scheme. Our results suggest that current chemical effect assessment methods overlook a substantial number of ecologically dangerous chemical pollutants and introduce a new operational framework for their systematic identification
Format: application/pdf
ISSN: 2375-2548
Document access: http://hdl.handle.net/10256/13915
Language: eng
Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science
Collection: Reproducció digital del document publicat a: http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1601272
Articles publicats (D-CCAA)
Is part of: Science Advances, 2016, núm. 2, p. e1601272
Rights: Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Spain
Rights URI: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/es/
Subject: Contaminants emergents en l’aigua
Emerging contaminants in water
Title: Hidden drivers of low-dose pharmaceutical pollutant mixtures revealed by the novel GSA-QHTS screening method
Type: info:eu-repo/semantics/article
Repository: DUGiDocs

Subjects

Authors