PESTICIDE

CONTAMINATION
Environmental Chemistry - Wednesday, November 1
  After this lecture, students are
expected to be able to:
 Explain the definition of
Learning pesticides
Outcomes  List different types of pesticides
 Explain the effect of pesticides on
humans
 Explain the transformation and
mobility of pesticides in the
environment
What is pesticide?

 Definition
Pesticides present the group of chemicals that are purposely applied to the environment with
aim to suppress plant and animal pests, and to protect agricultural and industrial products
 Types and classes of pesticides
 Insecticides (organochlorines, organophosphates and carbamates)
 Fungicides (Thiocarbamates, dithiocarbamates, cupric salts, tiabendazoles, triazoles,
dicarboximides, dinitrophenoles, organotin compounds)
 Herbicides (paraquat, glyphosate and propanil)
 Rodenticides (warfarines, indanodiones)
 Fumigant (cyanides, aluminium phosphate, methyl bromide)
 The first recorded use of pesticides was about 4500
years ago in Mesopotamia
 First generation of pesticides were by-products of
coal gas production or other industrial processes, or
other toxic compounds, such as arsenic or cyanide
 Second generation of pesticides use synthetic
organic compounds. History of
 The first important synthetic organic pesticide was a Pesticides
chlorinated hydrocarbon,
dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane or DDT. DDT was
discovered in 1939 by a Swiss chemist Paul Müller
 Among the ones who voiced the first concern over
pesticides was Rachel Carson, who wrote the book
Silent Spring in 1962
Effects of pesticide on
human can be:
Acute: immediate effect coming
from short-term exposure
(Example: sore throat, upset
stomach, nausea, pain or
tightness in chest, skin itching,
blisters, rash, eyes irritation,
temporary or permanent
blindness)
Chronic: effects resulting from
prolonged exposure (Example:
cancer, birth defects, nervous
system disorder)
Toxicity of pesticide
can expressed as:
LC50 (lethal concentration): the
concentration of the chemical in
the air or water that will kill 50%
of the test animals with a single Pesticide
exposure Toxicity
LD50 (lethal dose): a single dose
of a chemical that, when fed to a
group of test animals or applied
dermally, will kill 50% of the
animals, expressed in mg/kg, or
milligrams of substance per
kilogram of body weight
Pesticides in the Environment

 Factors determining how pesticide affect the environment:

 Active ingredients: the active ingredient is the material intended to kill the
target pest. It is the active ingredient that is toxic to the pest and has the
potential to be dangerous to other animals
 Contaminants: impurities of the active ingredients
 Additives: additional chemicals mixed with the active ingredients
 Degradates
 Toxicity
 Persistence
 Environmental fate
 Solid matter

The environmental fate of

pesticide is determined by the
Fate of affinity of pesticide in the Liquid
environmental compartments,
Pesticides in which comprise of:
the Gaseous form
Environment

Transport of pesticide between Biota

those compartments is often
called as partitioning
 Fate of Pesticide in the Environment
 Formulations of pesticides affect its fate in the environment
 The persistence of pesticides indicates how long said
pesticide remains in the environment. It is often expressed
as ‘half-life’ (t1/2).
 Residence time: the period of time in which a chemical
species remains in the compartment
 The persistence of pesticide in an environmental
compartment is determined by:
The chemical characteristic of the compound
The physical characteristic of the compound
Composition and characteristics of the compartment
Climatic condition
 Based on its halftime, pesticides can be categorized into: (1) nonpersistent
pesticides with a typical soil half-life of less than 30 days; (2) moderately
persistent pesticides with a typical soil half-life of 30 to 100 days; (3)
persistent pesticides with a typical soil half-life of more than 100 days
Microbial degradation: the breakdown of chemicals by microorganisms,
mediated by enzymes, usually is greatest in warm, moist, well-aerated soils
Fate of with a neutral pH

Pesticide in the Chemical degradation: occurs when a pesticide reacts with water, oxygen,
Environment or other chemicals in the soil. As soil pH becomes extremely acidic or
alkaline, microbial activity usually decreases. However, these conditions
may favor rapid chemical degradation.
Photodegradation: the breakdown of pesticides by sunlight, affected by
the intensity and spectrum of sunlight, length of exposure, and properties
of the pesticide affect the rate of photodegradation.
 Partitioning of Pesticides in the Environment
Humans
Plants Pore
Animals Plants
Air water

Soil
Soil
Target Particles
Application Pest

Ground
water
Aquatic
Organisms
Surface
water Sediment Sediment
organisms
  Partitioning or distribution of pesticide can be
expressed in a number of terms:
 KP: partitioning coefficient of compound between
the solid phase and the aqueous phase
Pesticide  Koc: partitioning coefficient between soil and the
partitioning in organic phase of soil
 Solubility
the  Henry’s constant (H and KH)
environment  KOW: n-octanol partitioning coefficient
 The above values can be used to calculate the
concentration of pesticide in the
compartments/medium
  Calculating partitioning coefficient (KP)

Pesticide  Pesticides are mostly organic compounds, and thus, often

Partitioning in have higher affinity to be adsorbed in the organic phase of
the soil. In that case, the concentration of pesticide in soil
the can be normalized as the concentration of pesticide in the
Environment organic carbon of soil

 In soil, ,
where
  The value of KOC is often estimated by using KOW value
Pesticide  KOW: partitioning coefficient between n-octanol/water
Partitioning in
the  Henry’s Constant shows the distribution of compound
Environment between air and water