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Updated: Sep 23, 2025
Clean Sampling and Analysis of River and Estuarine Waters for Trace Metal Studies
Published on: July 1, 2016
Source-specific ecological risk assessment and quantitative source apportionment of heavy metals in surface sediments
He Xiao1, Asfandyar Shahab2, Feng Ye3
1Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory, Guangzhou 511458, China; State Key Laboratory of Isotope Geochemistry, CAS Center for Excellence in Deep Earth Science, Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510640, China; College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Guilin University of Technology, Guilin 541004, China.
Abstract:
In this study, surface sediments of the Pearl River Estuary were collected from 29 stations and investigated the spatial distribution, pollution level, quantitative source apportionment, and source-specific ecological risk of 10 heavy metals. The mean concentrations followed the order of Mn > Zn > Cr > Cu > Ni > Pb > As > Co > Cd > Hg. In terms of spatial distribution, it showed that the heavy metals were enriched in the inner Pearl River Estuary with 'extremely high' level of Hg, whereas, Cd and Zn posed 'moderate to high' contamination potential. We apportioned four main sources using positive matrix factorization model, in which natural geogenic and industrial manufacturing sources accounted for 36.84% and 27.11% of the total, respectively. However, the source-specific risk assessment suggested that mixed anthropogenic sources were the main contributors, and ecological risks were strongly affected by anthropogenic imports from the surrounding cities.
