Photodegradation of 2-chloropyridine in aqueous solution: Reaction pathways and genotoxicity of intermediate products

2-Chloropyridine, an important precursor of the chemical industry is also a persistent water pollutant. The genotoxicity of photolytically treated 2-chloropyridine aqueous solution to human lymphocytes initially increases and fluctuates during treatment finally reaching the control values after prolonged treatment. Intermediate products formed were identified; a kinetic scheme for their formation is presented. To identify the source of genotoxicity variations and the potential in vitro effects on human lymphocytes of the partially photo-treated aqueous solution, the genotoxicity of four (the only) commercially available intermediates, i.e., 1H-pyrrole-2-carboxaldehyde, 6-chloro-2-pyridinecarboxylic acid, 2,3-dichloropyridine and 2-pyridinecarbonitrile was measured; the obtained results were used for the reasoning on the variation of the solution genotoxic (including clastogenic as well as aneugenic) events and cytotoxic activity. It was found that 1H-pyrrole-2-carboxaldehyde and 6-chloro-2-pyridinecarboxylic acid were highly genotoxic even at the very low concentration measured here. Thus, they likely had a significant contribution to the photolytically treated solution genotoxicity. 2,3-Dichloropyridine was found to be genotoxic but only at concentrations higher than the ones measured in this work. Thus, it was not likely to have contributed to the solution genotoxicity. Finally, at the concentrations measured in this work 2-pyridinecarbonitrile was found to be only cytotoxic.