The chemical and environmental property space of REACH chemicals

Öberg, T; Iqbal, MS

HERO ID

2150774

Reference Type

Journal Article

Year

2012

Language

English

PMID

22386455

HERO ID 2150774
In Press No
Year 2012
Title The chemical and environmental property space of REACH chemicals
Authors Öberg, T; Iqbal, MS
Journal Chemosphere
Volume 87
Issue 8
Page Numbers 975-981
Abstract The European regulation on chemicals, REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals), came into force on 1 June 2007. With pre-registration complete in 2008, data for these substances may provide an overview of the expected chemical space and its characteristics. In this paper, using various in silico computation tools, we evaluate 48782 neutral organic compounds from the list to identify hazardous and safe compounds. Two different classification schemes (modified Verhaar and ECOSAR) identified between 17% and 25% of the compounds as expressing only baseline toxicity (narcosis). A smaller portion could be identified as reactive (19%) or specifically acting (2.7%), while the majority were non-assigned (61%). Overall environmental persistence, bioaccumulation and long-range transport potential were evaluated using structure-activity relationships and a multimedia fugacity-based model. A surprisingly high proportion of compounds (20%), mainly aromatic and halogenated, had a very high estimated persistence (>195 d). The proportion of compounds with a very high estimated bioconcentration or bioaccumulation factor (>5000) was substantially less (6.9%). Finally, a list was compiled of those compounds within the applicability domain of the models used, meeting both persistence and bioaccumulation criteria, and with a long-range transport potential comparable to PCB. This list of 68 potential persistent organic pollutants contained many well-known compounds (all halogenated), but notably also five fluorinated compounds that were not included in the EINECS inventory. This study demonstrates the usability of in silico tools for identification of potentially environmentally hazardous chemicals.
Doi 10.1016/j.chemosphere.2012.02.034
Pmid 22386455
Wosid WOS:000302988100021
Is Certified Translation No
Dupe Override No
Is Public Yes
Language Text English
Keyword Screening; Environmental persistence; Bioaccumulation; Long-range transport; Perfluorinated compounds