Parabens in Sediment and Sewage Sludge from the United States, Japan, and Korea: Spatial Distribution and Temporal Trends

Parabens (alkyl esters of p-hydroxybenzoic acid) are widely used in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and foodstuffs as broad-spectrum antimicrobial preservatives. Laboratory animal studies have shown that parabens possess weak estrogenic activity. Widespread exposure of humans to parabens has raised significant public health concerns. Despite such concern, little is known about the occurrence of parabens in the environment. In this study, six paraben analogues, methyl- (MeP), ethyl- (EtP), propyl- (PrP), butyl- (BuP), benzyl- (BP), and heptyl parabens (HepP), were determined in surface sediment and sediment core samples collected from several locations in the United States (U.S.), Japan, and Korea by high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS). Concentrations of parabens also were determined in sewage sludge collected from several wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) in Korea. MeP was found in all samples, including surface sediment, sediment core, and sludge samples, at concentrations ranging from 0.312 to 540 ng/g dry weight (dw). PrP was detected in the majority of samples (79%), and the concentrations were, in general, 1-2 orders of magnitude lower than MeP concentrations. Significant positive correlations were found among the concentrations of paraben analogues in sediment and sludge, which suggested the existence of similar sources of origin for these compounds. The sum concentrations of six parabens (Sigma PBs) in sludge (geometric mean: 66.3, median: 89.5 ng/g dw) were remarkably higher than those in sediment (5.48, 5.24 ng/g dw). Vertical profiles of parabens in sediment cores from the U.S. showed a gradual increase in concentrations in the past decade, although such a trend was not clear in sediment core from Tokyo Bay, Japan.