posted on 2024-01-08, 16:04authored bySara Ghorbani Gorji, María José Gómez Ramos, Pradeep Dewapriya, Bastian Schulze, Rachel Mackie, Thi Minh Hong Nguyen, Christopher P. Higgins, Karl Bowles, Jochen F. Mueller, Kevin V. Thomas, Sarit L. Kaserzon
Monitoring contamination from per- and polyfluoroalkyl
substances
(PFASs) in water systems impacted by aqueous film-forming foams (AFFFs)
typically addresses a few known PFAS groups. Given the diversity of
PFASs present in AFFFs, current analytical approaches do not comprehensively
address the range of PFASs present in these systems. A suspect-screening
and nontarget analysis (NTA) approach was developed and applied to
identify novel PFASs in groundwater samples contaminated from historic
AFFF use. A total of 88 PFASs were identified in both passive samplers
and grab samples, and these were dominated by sulfonate derivatives
and sulfonamide-derived precursors. Several ultrashort-chain (USC)
PFASs (≤C3) were detected, 11 reported for the first
time in Australian groundwater. Several transformation products were
identified, including perfluoroalkane sulfonamides (FASAs) and perfluoroalkane
sulfinates (PFASis). Two new PFASs were reported (((perfluorohexyl)sulfonyl)sulfamic
acid; m/z 477.9068 and (E)-1,1,2,2,3,3,4,5,6,7,8,8,8-tridecafluorooct-6-ene-1-sulfonic
acid; m/z 424.9482). This study
highlights that several PFASs are overlooked using standard target
analysis, and therefore, the potential risk from all PFASs present
is likely to be underestimated.