Occurrence, source apportionment and ecological risk of bisphenol analogues in river sediments in areas with different land use patterns

Bisphenol analogues (BPs) have gained increasing attention in recent years due to their ubiquitousness and potential endocrine disrupting properties in environments. However, little information is available on their spatiotemporal distribution, source apportionment and ecological risk in river sediments, especially the case in river basins with a high population density and those typical regions with agricultural-urban gradient, where land use patterns and intensity of human activity are varying. In this study, field investigations of BPs in the sediment of the entire Qinhuai River Basin, a typical agricultural-suburban agricultural-urban gradient area, were conducted before and after the flood period. Thirty-two sites were sampled for six types of BPs, resulted in no significant difference in the concentration of ΣBPs between the two periods, with ΣBPs ranging from 3.92 to 151 ng/g and 2.16–59.0 ng/g, respectively. Bisphenol A (BPA) was the main contributor. Whereas a multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) suggested that the composition structure of BPs had been influenced by water periods. The land use patterns had an impact on the distribution of ΣBPs in river sediments, which was more significant in after the flood period, with ΣBPs in urban rivers was 1.85 times, 3.44 times, and 3.08 times higher than the suburban rivers, agricultural rivers, and reservoirs, respectively. Yet land use types did not significantly alter the composition structure of BPs. The correlation analysis between BPs and the physicochemical properties of sediments showed a significant positive correlation between BPA and total organic carbon (TOC). The positive matrix factorization model (PMF) suggested that BPs in sediments of the basin might be influenced by industrial coatings, textiles, electronics and biopharmaceuticals, as well as urban wastewater or solid waste generated from daily life. The ecological risk assessment posed by BPA, based on the risk quotient, indicated that the ecological risk of BPA in sediments was low for three indicator benthic organisms: crustaceans, worms, and mollusks. However, the risk of BPA in river sediments varied among different land use patterns, with the risk ranking as follows: reservoirs < agricultural rivers < suburban rivers < urban rivers.