Recent Status of Global Polychlorinated Biphenyls Contamination
Anirban Sil *
Division of Agricultural Chemicals, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi, India.
Mainak Barman
Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Bihar, India.
Saipayan Ghosh
Department of Agricultural Biotechnology and Molecular Biology, Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Bihar, India.
Kaushik Pramanik
Department of Entomology and Agricultural Zoology, Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India.
Sourav Sen
Department of Entomology, Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat, Assam, India.
Kunal Saha
Department of Horticulture, Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Bihar, India.
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
Organic pollutants are continuously disrupting the equilibrium of nature. Polychlorinated Biphenyls are a member of the broad family of man-made organic chemicals well-known as chlorinated hydrocarbons. Due to their chemical stability, high boiling point and electrical insulating properties, non-flammability, Polychlorinated Biphenyls are used in various commercial as well as industrial applications. Polychlorinated Biphenyls residues remain in the ecosystem and bioaccumulate in various organisms due to their persistent nature and resistance against natural breakdown agents. This leads to the enlisting of approximately 209 chlorinated congeners in the list of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) under the Stockholm Convention. Their residues have been detected in various environmental components even though their production has been banned for more than a decade. High residues of Polychlorinated Biphenyls in water bodies, aquatic faunas, soils and sediments, air, and biota samples have been reported. Therefore, the current review aims at depicting the source and dynamics of Polychlorinated Biphenyls in the environment as well as the exploitation of various detection tools for the analysis of Polychlorinated Biphenyls. Besides, it provides a critical description of worldwide contamination scenarios of Polychlorinated Biphenyls and the need for further advancement in the detection and extensive identification.
Keywords: Polychlorinated biphenyls, contamination, persistency, detection, analysis