Potential Environmental Risk Characteristics of PCB Transformation Products in the Environmental Medium

Abstract

The complementary construction of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) phytotoxicity and the biotoxicity 3D-QSAR model, combined with the constructed PCB environmental risk characterization model, was carried out to evaluate the persistent organic pollutant (POP) properties (toxicity (phytotoxicity and biotoxicity), bioconcentration, migration, and persistence) of PCBs and their corresponding transformation products (phytodegradation, microbial degradation, biometabolism, and photodegradation). The transformation path with a significant increase in environmental risks was analyzed. Some environmentally friendly PCB derivatives, exhibiting a good modification effect, and their parent molecules were selected as precursor molecules. Their transformation processes were simulated and evaluated for assessing the environmental risks. Some transformation products displayed increased environmental risks. The environmental risks of plant degradation products of the PCBs in the environmental media showed the maximum risk, indicating that the potential risks of the transformation products of the PCBs and their environmentally friendly derivatives could not be neglected. It is essential to further improve the ability of plants to degrade their transformation products. The improvement of some degradation products for environmentally friendly PCB derivatives indicates that the theoretical modification of a single environmental feature cannot completely control the potential environmental risks of molecules. In addition, this method can be used to analyze and evaluate environmentally friendly PCB derivatives to avoid and reduce the potential environmental and human health risks caused by environmentally friendly PCB derivatives.