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Microplastics pose a significant environmental threat, with potential implications for toxic chemical release, aquatic life endangerment, and human food chain contamination. In Asia, rapid economic growth coupled with inadequate waste management has escalated plastic pollution in rivers, positioning them as focal points for environmental concern. Despite Asia's rivers being considered the most polluted with plastics globally, scholarly attention to microplastics in the region's freshwater environments is a recent development. This study undertakes a systematic review of 228 scholarly articles to map microplastic hotspots in Asian freshwater systems and synthesize current research trends within the continent. Findings reveal a concentration of research in China and Japan, primarily investigating riverine and surface waters through net-based sampling methods. Polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) emerge as the predominant microplastic types, frequently observed as fibers or fragments. However, the diversity of sampling methodologies and reporting metrics complicates data synthesis, underscoring the need for standardized analytical frameworks to facilitate comparative analysis. This paper delineates the distribution of microplastic hotspots and outlines the prevailing challenges and prospects in microplastic research within Asian freshwater contexts., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Considering the extensive agricultural practices along the perennial rivers, viz. Periyar and Bharathappuzha of Kerala in the southwest coast of India, the first comprehensive surveillance of new and legacy organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) in surface sediment was conducted. Further, the sediment-water exchange fluxes have been elucidated. Mean concentrations of total HCH, DDT and endosulfan were 0.84 ng/g, 0.42 ng/g and 0.30 ng/g for Bharathappuzha Riverine sediment (BRS) and 1.08 ng/g, 0.39 ng/g and 0.35 ng/g for Periyar Riverine sediment (PRS). The dominance α-HCH and β-HCH isomers in PRS and BRS reflect the ongoing use of technical HCH in Kerala. The calculated K SW in both rivers was very low in comparison with other Indian rivers. The average log K' OC for all the detected OCPs in both the rivers was lower than the predicted log K OC in equilibrium indicating the higher adherence of OCPs to sediment. Furthermore, fugacity fraction (f s /f w ) was < 1.0 for all OCPs confirming the net deposition of OCPs into the sediment. Sediment concentrations for each of the OCPs in PRS and BRS did not surpass the threshold effect level and probable effect level as stipulated by the Canadian Council of Ministry of the Environment Guidelines. In addition, all the sites of both rivers had sediment quality guideline quotient (SQGQ) values below 0.1 indicating the absence of significant biological and ecological risks., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.)

Dental age estimation plays a key role in therapeutic, medicolegal, forensic, and anthropological applications. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the research progress on dental age estimation using bibliometric analysis. Data were gathered from Scopus, Web of Science and PubMed. Keyword co-occurrence analysis, collaboration network analysis, and descriptive analysis of bibliographic data were all completed using VOS viewer and Biblioshiny software. There has been an ongoing but gradual rise in research regarding dental age estimation, with notable increase since 2014. The country with the most publications published (205) was India. The year of 2018 (TP = 92) and 2021 (TP = 100) saw a rapid spike in publications and citations, respectively. The Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, which has 153 citations, was the most productive institution. Forensic Science International was the journal with the greatest number of publications (73). Author Cameriere had the maximum number of publications (30). The increase in publications associated to collaboration across numerous authors, nations, and institutes serves as evidence of the significant improvement in dental age estimation. This citation analysis allows for the identification of the most relevant and pertinent research fields while providing a view on the development of research in the field of dental age estimation.

Given the increased load of waste plastic in the solid waste stream after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, we investigated the fate of selected plastic additives along open burning dumps, industrial and residential transects in tropical riverine catchments of India. Polyurethane foam disk passive air samples, surface water and community stored water (CSW) samples were collected along the Adyar River (AR), Cooum River (CR) and canals in Chennai and Daman Ganga River (DG) in Vapi. Among the quantified phthalic acid esters (PAEs), a widely used plastic additive, di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), was ubiquitous across all the transects. More open drains and leaching of littered single-use plastic items can be the reason for significantly higher (p < 0.05) levels of PAEs in CR over other rivers with a dominance of di-n-butyl phthalate (DnBP). Prevalence of open burning of dumped plastic waste was the possible primary emission source of PAEs in these riverine catchments. Excluding highly soluble dimethyl phthalate (DMP), air-water exchange processes reflected the secondary emission of all the PAEs from the surface water along the open burning sites. Despite the cleansing effect of the oceanic air mass from the Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean, the average atmospheric PAE level was two-fold higher in Chennai than Vapi. Even though Vapi is a coastal city along the Arabian Sea, it was impacted by inland air masses during the sampling event. Open burning dumpsites showed a five-fold increase in atmospheric priority PAEs in Chennai city after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. DnBP was the major contributor to estrogenicity in CSW and DG, and also posed maximum risk for fishes in the open burning transect of these tropical rivers., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Detection of high pesticide concentrations in sediments and water often leads to prioritizing a site as being 'at risk'. However, the risk does not depend on pesticide concentration alone, but on other site-specific characteristics also. We developed an indicator that identifies the 'Level of Concern' by integrating five such characteristics: (i) pesticide concentrations in surface and groundwater causing risks to ecological health (ii) impacts on human health, (iii) water scarcity, (iv) agricultural production, and (v) biodiversity richness. We applied this framework in an agricultural region of the Lower Ganges Basin in West Bengal, India. We measured concentrations of selected organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) in surface and groundwater within an 8 km 2 area in 2019. Of 20 banned and restricted OCPs, 11 were detected as causing high risk to ecological health and 10 at concentrations above the Accepted Carcinogenic Risk Limit (ACRL) for humans. In the pre-monsoon, the mean concentrations of ΣOCPs in groundwater and surface water were 126.9 ng/L and 104 ng/L, in the monsoon they were 144.7 ng/L and 138 ng/L, and in the post-monsoon 122.1 ng/L and 147 ng/L respectively. In groundwater, no significant seasonal difference was observed in most pesticides. In the surface water, 7 pesticides were significantly higher in the monsoon and post-monsoon, which may be attributed to increased runoff as well as post monsoon application of OCPs. In September 2022 we again measured OCP concentrations in surface water and sediment. The mean concentration of 14 of the 20 measured OCPs were found to be significantly lower in the post-pandemic period compared to the pre-pandemic time. These lower pesticide concentrations may indicate a reduced use of OCPs in agricultural practices during the pandemic. This area was identified as being at the highest Level of Concern, even though the OCP concentrations alone conformed to general guidelines., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Mining activities in the opencast coal mines contaminate the surrounding soil by releasing coal dust containing heavy metals (HMs). The objective of the present study was to quantify the concentration of HMs like Fe, Cu, Mn, Ni, Cr, Zn, and Co in soil on profile and distance basis in the vicinity of the coal mines. This research also proposed the synthesis application of positive matrix factorization (PMF) model for the quantitative assessment of pollution sources. The results showed that the soil was more affected due to the presence of Cr in mining areas., and the contamination factor (C f ) of Cr was high at the edge of coal mine. It was observed from the study that C f  of the HMs was decreased with the increase in distance from the mine edge. The application of PMF model demonstrated that the contributions of Zn (4.2%), Ni (16.8%), and Mn (100%) were maximum in the pollution. The study concluded that soil contamination is inexorable due to opencast coal mining activities, and it can be mitigated by developing a green belt or through the process of ecological restoration and phytoremediation., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.)

This study is the first attempt to assess the presence of 16 priority polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) enlisted by the US Environmental Protection Agency in PM 2.5 and PM 10 from industrial areas of Odisha State, India. During 2017-2018, bimonthly sampling of PM 10 and PM 2.5 was carried out for 24 h in the industrial and mining areas of Jharsuguda and Angul in Odisha during the pre-monsoon, monsoon, and post monsoon seasons. Highest mean concentration of ∑ 16 PAHs in PM 2.5 was observed during the post monsoon (170 ng/m 3 ) period followed by pre-monsoon (48 ng/m 3 ) and monsoon (16 ng/m 3 ) periods, respectively. A similar trend of ∑ 16 PAHs was also observed in PM 10 with higher levels observed during post monsoon (286 ng/m 3 ) followed by pre-monsoon (81 ng/m 3 ) and monsoon (27 ng/m 3 ) seasons. Diagnostic ratios and principal component analysis suggested diesel, gasoline and coal combustion as the major contributors of atmospheric PAH pollution in Odisha. Back trajectory analysis revealed that PAH concentration was affected majorly by air masses originating from the northwest direction traversing through central India. Toxic equivalents ranged between 0.24 and 94.13 ng TEQ/m 3 . In our study, the incremental lifetime cancer risk ranged between 10 -5 and 10 -3 , representing potential cancer risk., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.)

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) such as phthalic acid esters (PAEs) and bisphenol A (BPA) are the most widely used plastic additives in polymeric materials. These EDCs are ubiquitously distributed in the environment. Hence selected PAEs and BPA were investigated in twenty-five food types and drinking water (supply and packaged) from the metropolitan city, Delhi, and the peri-urban areas of a non-metropolitan city, Dehradun. Except cabbage and orange, the sum of thirteen PAEs (∑ 13 PAEs) and BPA in all the other food types were significantly higher in Delhi over Dehradun (p < 0.01). Highest mean ∑ 13 PAEs (665 ng/g) and BPA (73 ng/g) were observed in cottage cheese and potatoes, respectively followed by fish (PAEs - 477 ng/g, BPA - 16 ng/g). Supply water from the west zone of Delhi was found to contain the highest concentration of BPA (309 ng/L) and ∑ 13 PAEs (5765 ng/L) with the dominance of diethyl phthalate (DEP). Based on the compositional profile and compound-wise principal component analysis, environmental contamination and food processing were attributed as significant sources of most priority PAEs in food samples. Di-ethyl hexyl phthalate (DEHP) was over 100-fold higher in the bottled water from local brands than composite bottled water samples. Packaging material was identified as a source for di-n-butyl phthalate (DnBP) in packaged food. This study observed the highest estimated daily dietary intake (EDI) in the high-fat-containing food products viz., cottage cheese, and fish from north Delhi. High bioaccumulation of BPA can be a possible reason for elevated EDI in vegetables and local fish of Delhi. Unlike Dehradun, EDI for ∑ 13 PAEs and BPA was slightly higher for the non-vegetarian adult when compared to the vegetarian adult. DEHP and DnBP exhibited the highest estimated estrogenic potential for bottled water from local brands. Dietary exposure due to six priority PAEs contamination in food stuffs was two to four-fold higher in Delhi than Dehradun for adult man and woman., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Background: The recent outbreak of respiratory illness caused by COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, has received global attention as it has infected thousands of individuals there, and later it has also been reported from other countries internationally. This study aims at performing an exploratory study on Twitter to understand the information shared among the community regarding the COVID-19 outbreak., Methods: COVID-19 related tweets were collected from Twitter using keywords from 18 January to 25 January 2020. Top-ranking tweets were taken as samples and then categorised based on the content. Expressions or opinion tweets were analysed qualitatively to understand the mindset of the people regarding the outbreak. Theme wise reachability evaluation of the messages was also performed., Results: Based on the content of the tweets, five themes were evolved: (1) general information; (2) health information; (3) expressions; (4) humour and (5) others. 57.42% of messages are general information followed by expressive tweets (24.12%). Humorous messages were liked the most, whereas health information tweets were retweeted the maximum. Fear was the predominant emotion expressed in the messages., Conclusion: The results of the study would be useful to focus on the dissemination of the right information and effective communication on Twitter related to health and outbreak management., Competing Interests: Competing interests: None declared., (© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2020. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.)

The world health organization (WHO) formally proclaimed the novel coronavirus, called COVID-19, a worldwide pandemic on March 11 2020. In December 2019, COVID-19 was first identified in Wuhan city, China, and now coronavirus has spread across various nations infecting more than 198 countries. As the cities around China started getting contaminated, the number of cases increased exponentially. As of March 18 2020, the number of confirmed cases worldwide was more than 250,000, and Asia alone had more than 81,000 cases. The proposed model uses time series analysis to forecast the outbreak of COVID-19 around the world in the upcoming days by using an autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA). We analyze data from February 1 2020 to April 1 2020. The result shows that 120,000 confirmed fatal cases are forecasted using ARIMA by April 1 2020. Moreover, we have also evaluated the total confirmed cases, the total fatal cases, autocorrelation function, and white noise time-series for both confirmed cases and fatalities in the COVID-19 outbreak., (Copyright © 2020 Dansana, Kumar, Das Adhikari, Mohapatra, Sharma, Priyadarshini and Le.)

Given the extensive indiscriminate usage in the past and limited ongoing use, organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) have been widely reported in the Hooghly riverine environment. Hence, surface riverine sediment samples were collected along the urban and suburban transects of the Hooghly River and OCPs were quantified in gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Mean concentration of HCH, DDT, and endosulfan was 5 ng g -1 , 10 ng g -1 , and 4 ng g -1 respectively. DDT was dominant among all the OCPs and contributed nearly 40% to the total OCPs possibly due to the ongoing use of DDT for vector control programs. Diagnostic ratios suggest recent source of lindane, DDT, and endosulfan. Using OCP concentration from previously published data in surface water during the same time frame, sediment-water partitioning of OCPs was estimated. Excluding α-HCH and γ-HCH in few pockets, majority of the OCPs tend to partition more on to sediment. Comparing the sediment concentration with the sediment quality guideline values, risk on ecological integrities was indicated due to DDT and HCH contamination. Suburban sites indicated higher risk than urban sites according to the calculated sediment quality guideline quotient (SQGQ). A brief review on the approach to pesticidal POP pollution management in India revealed that older management approaches should be replaced with a unique, integrated, and holistic system.

Sixteen priority polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) regulated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) were analyzed in surface waters and riverine sediments of Brahmaputra and Hooghly Rivers, along urban-suburban-rural transects. ∑ 16 PAHs concentrations were higher in Hooghly riverine sediment (HRS) (Avg, 445 ng g -1 ) than Brahmaputra riverine sediment (BRS) (Avg, 169 ng g -1 ) dominated by 4-ring PAHs. In contrast, PAHs concentrations in surface water of Brahmaputra River (BRW) (Avg, 4.04 μg L -1 ) were comparable with Hooghly River (HRW) (Avg, 4.8 μg L -1 ), with dominance by 3-ring PAHs. Toxic PAHs (BaA, Chr, BbF, BkF, BaP, InP and DBA) were dominant in sub-urban transect of HRS (Avg, 387 ng g -1 ) and BRS (Avg, 14 ng g -1 ). Diagnostic ratios, principal component analysis (PCA) and ring wise composition suggested combustion as the main PAHs source in these riverine belts. In BRS, higher PAHs in suburban and rural transects were attributed to incomplete combustion of fossil fuel and biomass burning. In HRS, >85% of high molecular weight PAHs were found in the industrial areas of the suburban transect possibly associated with the discharge of industrial effluents. Harbor and port activities were other major contributors of HMW-PAHs in Hooghly riverine system. Carcinogenic potency estimated in terms of toxic equivalent (TEQ) was several folds higher in HRS (Avg, 106 ng TEQ g -1 ) compared with BRS (Avg, 2.5 ng TEQ g -1 ). Mostly low molecular weight PAHs are likely posing a risk to fishes in both the rivers. Risk on edible fish species may be a matter of concern considering the regular consumption of fishes in this region., (Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

• Inorganic arsenic (As(i) ) in rice (Oryza sativa) grains is a possible threat to human health, with risk being strongly linked to total dietary rice consumption and consumed rice As(i) content. This study aimed to identify the range and stability of genetic variation in grain arsenic (As) in rice. • Six field trials were conducted (one each in Bangladesh and China, two in Arkansas, USA over 2 yr, and two in Texas, USA comparing flooded and nonflood treatments) on a large number of common rice cultivars (c. 300) representing genetic diversity among international rice cultivars. • Within each field there was a 3-34 fold range in grain As concentration which varied between rice subpopulations. Importantly, As(i) correlated strongly with total As among a subset of 40 cultivars harvested in Bangladesh and China. • Genetic variation at all field sites was a large determining factor for grain As concentration, indicating that cultivars low in grain As could be developed through breeding. The temperate japonicas exhibited lower grain As compared with other subpopulations. Effects for year, location and flooding management were also statistically significant, suggesting that breeding strategies must take into account environmental factors., (© 2011 The Authors. New Phytologist © 2011 New Phytologist Trust.)