Impacts of biochar aging on its interactions with As(III) and the combined cytotoxicity

Despite the extensive use of biochar (BC) in soil and aqueous media for pollutant immobilization, the environmental behaviors and health risks of aged BC with multiple pollutants, especially with metal ions possessing various valence states, remain unexplored. Here, we prepared fresh banana peel BC (BP-BC) and aged BP-BCs by acidification (ABP-BC) and oxidation (OBP-BC). ABP-BC was then chosen to explore its environmental behaviors (i.e., adsorption, desorption, and arsenic valence transfer) towards As(III)-Cu(II) and the combined cytotoxicity of BCs with As(III)-Cu(II) was investigated in Human Gastric epithelium cells (GES-1). Our results demonstrate that the aging process notably alters the physicochemical properties of BP-BC, including surface morphology, elemental composition, and surface functional groups, which are key factors affecting the long-term environmental behaviors of BC with As(III)/Cu(II). Specifically, the aging process significantly enhanced the adsorption of As(III) on BC but reduced the adsorption of Cu(II). Although the oxidation of As(III) to As(V) did not change much, the aging process improved the stability of ABP-BC-metal ion complexes, alleviating the release of As(III) in acidic solution. Consequently, the combined cytotoxicity induced by ABP-BC-As(III)-Cu(II) was reduced compared to BP-BC-As(III)-Cu(II). The study highlights the critical roles of the aging process in regulating the As(III) adsorption/desorption dynamics on BCs and their combined cytotoxicity in the presence of multiple metal ions.