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Rice life cycle-based global mercury biotransport and human methylmercury exposure.

ABSTRACT: Protecting the environment and enhancing food security are among the world's greatest challenges. Fish consumption is widely considered to be the single significant dietary source of methylmercury. Nevertheless, by synthesizing data from the past six decades and using a variety of models, we find that rice could be a significant global dietary source of human methylmercury exposure, especially in South and Southeast Asia. In 2013, globalization caused 9.9% of human methylmercury exposure via the international rice trade and significantly aggravated rice-derived exposure in Africa (62%), Central Asia (98%) and Europe (42%). In 2016, 180 metric tons of mercury were generated in rice plants, 14-fold greater than that exported from oceans via global fisheries. We suggest that future research should consider both the joint ingestion of rice with fish and the food trade in methylmercury exposure assessments, and anthropogenic biovectors such as crops should be considered in the global mercury cycle.

SUBMITTER: Liu M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6856186 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Rice life cycle-based global mercury biotransport and human methylmercury exposure.

Liu Maodian M Zhang Qianru Q Cheng Menghan M He Yipeng Y Chen Long L Zhang Haoran H Cao Hanlin H Shen Huizhong H Zhang Wei W Tao Shu S Wang Xuejun X

Nature communications 20191114 1

Protecting the environment and enhancing food security are among the world's greatest challenges. Fish consumption is widely considered to be the single significant dietary source of methylmercury. Nevertheless, by synthesizing data from the past six decades and using a variety of models, we find that rice could be a significant global dietary source of human methylmercury exposure, especially in South and Southeast Asia. In 2013, globalization caused 9.9% of human methylmercury exposure via the ...[more]

PMID: 31727892

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Project description:BackgroundThe Life Cycle Initiative, hosted at the United Nations Environment Programme, selected human toxicity impacts from exposure to chemical substances as an impact category that requires global guidance to overcome current assessment challenges. The initiative leadership established the Human Toxicity Task Force to develop guidance on assessing human exposure and toxicity impacts. Based on input gathered at three workshops addressing the main current scientific challenges and questions, the task force built a roadmap for advancing human toxicity characterization, primarily for use in life cycle impact assessment (LCIA).ObjectivesThe present paper aims at reporting on the outcomes of the task force workshops along with interpretation of how these outcomes will impact the practice and reliability of toxicity characterization. The task force thereby focuses on two major issues that emerged from the workshops, namely considering near-field exposures and improving dose–response modeling.DiscussionThe task force recommended approaches to improve the assessment of human exposure, including capturing missing exposure settings and human receptor pathways by coupling additional fate and exposure processes in consumer and occupational environments (near field) with existing processes in outdoor environments (far field). To quantify overall aggregate exposure, the task force suggested that environments be coupled using a consistent set of quantified chemical mass fractions transferred among environmental compartments. With respect to dose–response, the task force was concerned about the way LCIA currently characterizes human toxicity effects, and discussed several potential solutions. A specific concern is the use of a (linear) dose–response extrapolation to zero. Another concern addresses the challenge of identifying a metric for human toxicity impacts that is aligned with the spatiotemporal resolution of present LCIA methodology, yet is adequate to indicate health impact potential.ConclusionsFurther research efforts are required based on our proposed set of recommendations for improving the characterization of human exposure and toxicity impacts in LCIA and other comparative assessment frameworks. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP3871.

Dataset Information

Rice life cycle-based global mercury biotransport and human methylmercury exposure.

Publications

Rice life cycle-based global mercury biotransport and human methylmercury exposure.

Similar Datasets

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