contaminants Archives - Amazing Health Advances

Bacteria Found to Eat Forever Chemicals & Even Some of Their Toxic Byproducts

The AHA! Team — Mon, 24 Mar 2025 05:36:09 +0000

University at Buffalo via EurekAlert! – University at Buffalo study shows that strain taken from contaminated soil breaks apart the strong carbon-fluorine bonds of PFAS, as well as some of the shorter-chain PFAS left behind In the quest to take the “forever” out of “forever chemicals,” bacteria might be our ally. Most remediation of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) involves adsorbing and trapping them, but certain microbes can actually break apart the strong chemical bonds that allow these chemicals to persist for so long in the environment. Now, a University at Buffalo-led team has identified a strain of bacteria that can break down and transform at least three types of PFAS, and, perhaps even more crucially, some of the toxic byproducts of the bond-breaking process. A strain of bacteria that can break down and transform at least three types of PFAS Published in this month’s issue of Science of the Total Environment, the team’s study found that Labrys portucalensis F11 (F11) metabolized over 90% of perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) following an exposure period of 100 days. PFOS is one of the most frequently detected and persistent types of PFAS and was designated hazardous by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last year. The F11 bacteria also broke down a substantial portion of two additional types of PFAS after 100 days: 58% of 5:3 fluorotelomer carboxylic acid and 21% of 6:2 fluorotelomer sulfonate. The bond between carbon and fluorine atoms in PFAS is very strong “The bond between carbon and fluorine atoms in PFAS is very strong, so most microbes cannot use it as an energy source. The F11 bacterial strain developed the ability to chop away the fluorine and eat the carbon,” says the study’s corresponding author, Diana Aga, PhD, SUNY Distinguished Professor and Henry M. Woodburn Chair in the Department of Chemistry, within the UB College of Arts and Sciences, and director of the UB RENEW Institute. Unlike many prior studies on PFAS-degrading bacteria, Aga’s study accounted for shorter-chain breakdown products — or metabolites. In some cases, F11 even removed fluorine from these metabolites or broke them down to minute, undetectable levels. “Many previous studies have only reported the degradation of PFAS, but not the formation of metabolites. We not only accounted for PFAS byproducts but found some of them continued to be further degraded by the bacteria,” says the study’s first author, Mindula Wijayahena, a PhD student in Aga’s lab. The work was supported by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, part of the National Institutes of Health. Other collaborators include the Catholic University of Portugal, the University of Pittsburgh and the Waters Corp. Picky eaters learn to like PFAS PFAS are a group of ubiquitous chemicals widely used since the 1950s in everything from nonstick pans to fire-fighting materials. They’re far from the meal of choice for any bacterium, but some that live in contaminated soil have mutated to break down organic contaminants like PFAS so that they can use their carbon as an energy source. “If bacteria survive in a harsh, polluted environment, it’s probably because they have adapted to use surrounding chemical pollutants as a food source so they don’t starve,” Aga says. “Through evolution, some bacteria can develop effective mechanisms to use chemical contaminants to help them grow.” The bacterial strain used in this study, F11, was isolated from the soil of a contaminated industrial site in Portugal and had previously demonstrated the ability to strip fluorine from pharmaceutical contaminants. However, it had never been tested on PFAS. Collaborators from the Catholic University of Portugal placed F11 in sealed flasks with no carbon source aside from 10,000 micrograms per liter of PFAS. Following incubation periods of between 100 to 194 days, the samples were then shipped to UB, where analysis revealed that F11 had degraded some of the PFAS. The elevated levels of fluoride ions detected in these samples indicated that F11 had detached the PFAS’ fluorine atoms so that the bacteria could metabolize the carbon atoms. F11 was not only chopping PFOS into smaller pieces, but also removing the fluorine from those smaller pieces “The carbon-fluorine bond is what makes PFAS so difficult to break down, so to break them apart is a critical step. Crucially, F11 was not only chopping PFOS into smaller pieces, but also removing the fluorine from those smaller pieces,” Wijayahena says. Some of the metabolites left behind still contained fluorine, but after being exposed to PFOS for 194 days, F11 had even removed fluorine from three PFOS metabolites. “As a caveat, there could be other metabolites in these samples so miniscule that they elude current detection methods,” Aga says. Making PFAS a desirable menu item While UB researchers say their study is a good start, they caution that the F11 took 100 days to biodegrade a significant portion of the supplied PFAS, and there were no other carbon sources available for consumption. The team now plans to research how to encourage F11 to consume PFAS faster, even when there are competing energy choices that could increase their growth rate. “We want to investigate the impact of placing alternative carbon sources alongside the PFAS. However, if that carbon source is too abundant and easy to degrade, the bacteria may not need to touch the PFAS at all,” Aga says. “We need to give the F11 colonies enough food to grow, but not enough food that they lose the incentive to convert PFAS into a usable energy source.” Eventually, F11 could be deployed in PFAS-contaminated water and soil. This might involve creating conditions to grow the strain within activated sludge at a wastewater treatment plant, or even injecting the bacteria directly into the soil or groundwater of a contaminated site, a process called bioaugmentation. “In wastewater- activated sludge systems, you could accelerate removal of undesired compounds by adding a specific strain to the existing bacterial consortium in the treatment plants,” Aga says. “Bioaugmentation is a promising method that has not yet been explored for PFAS remediation in the environment.” Journal Science of The Total Environment DOI 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.178348 Method of Research To read the original article about Bacteria Found to Eat Forever Chemicals click here.

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Heavy Metal Detox Diet

AHA Publisher — Mon, 13 Jun 2022 07:00:44 +0000

Michael Greger M.D. FACLM via Nutrition Facts – What dietary change can simultaneously help detoxify mercury, lead, and cadmium from the body? I’ve previously explored the issue of lead contamination in calcium supplements, such as bonemeal, but bone meal isn’t all that can be contaminated. “Substantial quantities of lead have been reported in some over-the-counter calcium supplement preparations,” and testing has revealed continued public health concern over bonemeal. Thankfully, bonemeal isn’t as popular these days, so most of us aren’t likely to get exposed directly to the lead in bonemeal anymore. We may, however, get exposed indirectly through the animals we eat, as I show at 0:31 in my video How to Lower Heavy Metals with Diet. In the United States, five billion pounds of meat and bonemeal are produced annually as slaughterhouse by-products. What do we do with these millions of tons every year? We feed it back to farm animals, particularly chickens. Now, most of the lead in the bonemeal passes right through the animals into their waste, but we take that waste—that cow, pig, and chicken feces—and feed it right back to the animals once again. So, you can see how the levels of contaminants might build up in their bodies. You may remember that I’ve talked before about what all this might mean for making something like chicken soup, but the original concern about these kinds of feeding practices, such as feeding cows to pigs, chickens, and even other cows, was about spreading prion diseases, like mad cow. This kind of recycling not only magnifies prions, however; it also magnifies other toxic substances, including lead. So, a more plant-based diet may be able to lower lead exposure, and an even more plant-based diet could theoretically lower exposure even more. What happens when you put it to the test? Should we really expect to find a benefit? As you can see at 1:42 in my video, even though lead is one of the toxins found in meat, half of our dietary exposure probably comes from plant foods. In fact, dietary modeling studies in Europe suggest that vegetarians would be exposed to about the same amount of lead compared to the general population, with the exception of those who eat a lot of wild game, which can have a thousand times more lead than most other foods, as you can see at 2:02 in my video. A vegetarian diet may even be higher in lead. It’s not what you eat, though; it’s what you absorb. As I’ve discussed previously, researchers found that the uptake of toxic heavy metals from “animal food sources” into human intestinal lining cells may be higher than from vegetable sources. This is why you can have a vegetarian with some of the lowest concentrations of lead and cadmium in their blood, despite having higher concentrations in their diet. As you can see at 2:41 in my video, there seems to be a tendency towards higher fecal elimination of lead following a change to a vegetarian diet. Researchers found that nine subjects, on average, tripled their elimination of lead, three were unaffected, and four saw their levels drop by about half. The study only lasted a few months, though, and the difference wasn’t statistically significant. So, what would happen in a year? Subjects made the shift to a diet “characterized by large amounts of raw vegetables, fruits, unrefined foods, and whole-meal products [whole grains] and the exclusion of meat, poultry, fish, and eggs” (though it did include fermented dairy, like a type of soured milk). They also cut back on processed foods and junk. Researchers took clippings of their hair before and after the dietary shift and got significant reductions in heavy metals, including cutting their lead level nearly in half. As you can see at 3:28 in my video, within three months of the dietary shift, the mercury, cadmium, and lead that had been oozing from their body into their hair went down and stayed down. How do we know the reduction in toxic heavy metal levels wasn’t just a coincidence? A few years after the study was over, after the participants had gone back to more of their regular diet, their mercury, cadmium, and lead levels shot back up to where they were before. Researchers found the same with a different group of subjects after two years on a vegetarian diet. The drop in mercury is easy to explain, as it’s presumably due to the drastic drop in fish consumption, and the drop in alcoholic beverages may have contributed to the drop in lead. There also could have been a cadmium-like effect, where the decrease in hair lead content could be due to the dietary shift that resulted in less absorption of lead into the body in the first place. I have a 16-part series on lead, starting with How the Lead Paint Industry Got Away with It. The series includes videos with specific food recommendations. For example, check out Best Food for Lead Poisoning: Garlic and Yellow Bell Peppers for Male Infertility and Lead Poisoning? KEY TAKEAWAYS Substantial quantities of lead have been found in some over-the-counter calcium supplements, and there is continued public health concerns over bonemeal. Although bonemeal is not as popular today, we may be getting exposed to lead indirectly through the animals we eat. Millions of tons of meat and bonemeal are produced each year in the United States as slaughterhouse by-products and may be fed back to farm animals, particularly chickens. Most of the lead in the bonemeal passes through them into their, but that cow, pig, and chicken feces may then be fed back once again to farm animals. In this way, levels of contaminants may build up in their bodies. These kinds of recycled feeding practices, such as feeding cows to pigs, chickens, and even other cows, facilitate the spread of prion diseases, like mad cow, but they also magnify other toxic substances, including lead. Lead is a toxin found in meat, but half of our dietary exposure likely comes from plant foods. (Notably, wild game can have a thousand times more lead than most other foods.) It’s not what we eat, though; it’s what we absorb, and researchers have found that the uptake of toxic heavy metals from “animal food sources” into our intestinal lining cells may be higher than from vegetable sources, explaining why vegetarians can have some of the lowest concentrations of lead and cadmium in their blood, despite having higher concentrations in their diet. After changing to a vegetarian diet, there seems to be a tendency towards higher fecal elimination of lead. Indeed, researchers took clippings of study participants’ hair before and after the dietary shift and found significant reductions in heavy metals, including cutting their lead level nearly in half and lowering the mercury and cadmium in their bodies. A few years after the study concluded and the subjects had gone back to more of their regular diet, their mercury, cadmium, and lead levels elevated back up. To read the original article click here.

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SHOCKING Truth You Should Know About Your Drinking Water

AHA Publisher — Wed, 28 Jul 2021 07:00:43 +0000

Wendy Miller via NaturalHealth365 – Too many people believe that since our drinking water is readily available and clear, it contains few to no contaminants. The fact is, almost 41% of our water supply that comes from wells contains some type of pesticide or other contaminants. Close to one-third contains some type of pesticide degradates. Degradates are produced as pesticides transform into various other compounds. Both pesticides and degradates can have a disastrous effect on a person’s health. There are solutions, however. How Pesticides Make Their Way Into Your Drinking Water Pesticides are applied to agricultural fields to reduce the risk of potential loss due to various types of pests. The problem is that the pesticides are washed off of the plants and into the ground. Rain and melting snow then carry them along the ground’s surface to lakes, streams, rivers, and ponds. Precipitation also carries the pesticides deep into the soil where it reaches our groundwater supply. Once it enters the aquifers and wells, it is then drawn up through pumps into our city water supplies. It is also drawn into the wells that supply rural homes. Pesticides Are More Prevalent Than You Think Even though many think that pesticides are only a problem in rural areas, pesticides are also sometimes found in the aquifers that support larger communities. Both pesticides and degradates can make their way into almost any water supply simply by following the path that water takes. Spraying is not the only way pesticides are applied. Aerial applications can spread pesticides much farther than their designated target area. This means the pesticides can be carried by the wind just as much as the water carries them. As a result, the migration patterns of pesticides are widespread no matter how it is transferred. Let’s Take a Closer Look at Pesticides in Groundwater There are four common herbicides found in groundwater samples. They include prometon, atrazine, tebuthiuron, and hexazinone. In addition to these pesticides, many mixtures of the four show up in various concentrations in aquifers and other surface bodies of water. Even though maximum contaminant levels have been established when it comes to pesticides, there are no real water quality benchmarks to go by. The Environmental Protection Agency has yet to develop definitive limits on when MCL’s actually become harmful to humans. What Can Be Done to Minimize Pesticides in Drinking Water? The introduction of organic practices in land management is a good start when it comes to cleaning up our water supply. Organic and regenerative agricultural practices will help reduce the number of pesticides being used and limit the number of chemicals that end up in our water supplies. As water moves through the soil on its way to the aquifer, a small portion of the chemicals and pesticides are filtered out. With fewer pesticides being used, less will eventually be found in our drinking water. The next time you draw a glass of water from the tap, think about how you can improve the water quality in your area. Find out what organic and regenerative agricultural practices are being used in your area. Learning as much as you can about what impacts our drinking water can be an eye-opening experience. And, of course, make sure – if needed – that you’re using a good water purification system or drinking a clean source of natural spring water. Sources for this article include: NaturalHealth365 EPA ACS.org To read the original article click here. For more articles from NaturalHealth365 click here.

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