DETERMINATION BY MASS SPECTROMETRY OF THE BIOACCUMULATION POTENTIAL OF EMERGING CONTAMINANTS IN BIOFILM.

Abstract

Personal hygiene products, such as UV filters, are consumed daily and released at sewage treatment plants. The presence of these compounds in aquatic environments may cause concern, as their impacts are not yet fully known. Biofilms can be an innovative and simple tool for monitoring the bioaccumulation of contaminants such as UV filters in aquatic environments. The present work aimed to determine and evaluate the potential of bioaccumulation of these compounds in biofilm and in the surface waters of the Barigui River. The determination of contaminants in environmental matrices was performed by liquid chromatography coupled to triple-quadrupole mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). The validation of the methodology used was based on the acceptance criteria of the National Institute of Metrology, Quality and Technology (Inmetro). The results obtained in the samples ranged from the maximums of 5.85 μg L–1 of benzophenone-1 for water samples to 1907.40 μg kg–1 of benzophenone-3 for biofilm. The study showed that biofilm is a very useful new tool in environmental monitoring, mainly due to the bioaccumulation capacity of UV filters.