Recipient Organization
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, RIVERSIDE
(N/A)
RIVERSIDE,CA 92521
Performing Department
Molecular, Cell and Systems Biology
Non Technical Summary
Electronic cigarettes (ECs) are a relatively new type of environmental waste. ECs are not readily degradable in the environment, and they can leak battery chemicals, heavy metals, such as nickel and chromium, and nicotine into soil and ground water. Nicotine that leaches into the soil can be taken up by crop plants and contaminate commodities. Heavy metals and battery components can present a health risk to wildlife and humans. While cigarette butt pollution has been studied for years, we know very little about EC pollution of the environment. This study will sample EC waste in various field sites in southern California, including the UCR campus, and will establish the types of ECs that are discarded, establish the condition of the batteries, the frequency and rate of their appearance over 5 years, and how much nicotine and metal they add to natural soil and/or water resources. In parallel, we will quantify metals in EC products that have been stored, hence aged, in our lab for over 10 years. We would expect to see increases in heavy metals, which would likely leach from the filament during storage. We will compute the rate of change of metals over storage time and determine if nicotine is stable or breaks down during storage. Data from the field and lab will be compared to determine if they are congruent. Our project will be one of the first to study EC waste and its potential to harm food, water and soil and may serve as the basis for implementing regulations for the safe disposable of ECs in the future.
Animal Health Component
10%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
90%
Applied
10%
Developmental
(N/A)
Goals / Objectives
This project will address electronic cigarette (EC) waste, a new environmental pollutant that has received very little prior attention.ECs, which are not biodegradable, can contribute to environmental pollution in three ways. First, all ECs have a battery, which eventually must be discarded. There is not policy or uniform regulation on discarding of EC batteries, and they end up in the environment often in landfills or public places where their decomposition will contribute battery chemicals to the soil and water. There is also a danger that EC batteries will explode , which could initiate forest fires or other types of environmental damage. Waste trucks have recently experienced explosions thought to be due to EC batteries. Secondly, the atomizing units of ECs are made of various metal parts that include nickel and chromium, and when discarded into the environment, atomizers can contribute leachates of heavy metals to ground water and soil. Third, discarded ECs contain residual e-fluid, which contains nicotine and metals/metalloids that by themselves are toxic and may also undergo reactions to form more potent toxicants that transfer directly to the environment. All EC components add to environmental pollution and could affect drinking water, agricultural water, soil, and other natural resources, such as forests.The use of ECs has grown exponentially in the last decade. They are becoming an environmental pollutant at a rapid rate and may eventually surpass tobacco cigarettes as a major source of environmental pollution. They also present a different type of pollution than tobacco cigarettes, as they contain batteries and atomizers that are not readily degradable. Strategies to deal with EC environmental pollution are needed.We propose to examine the contribution of ECs to environmental pollution with the intent of getting in front of this problem and providing scientific data that could be used to regulate the disposal of ECs.Our lab has over 10 years of experience working with ECs. We have published papers dealing with the design, evolution, topography, metal content, aerosol composition, cytotoxicity, health effects, and flavor chemicals in these products. We have also done work showing the EC aerosols deposit and remain on surfaces. We have collected EC products over the past 10 years and saved samples of both unused and used ECs, which will be analyzed in inthis project. The represents a unique collection of ECs that will enable us to determine how e-juice ages and what chemicals accumulate in aged products. For example, nickel and chromium likely leach from the filament over time and their concentrations in e-fluid would be expected to increase. Metals may also be higher in fluids from used ECs than from unused products as the filaments become delicate and the solder joints become friable with use, making accumulation of metals in fluids more likely. EC are very leaky, and their contents could readily leach into the environment. Our collection of "aged" EC is unique and will provide the first information on chemicals/metals in EC products that have aged over 10 year.Objectives: The overall objective of our Hatch project is to understand how ECs contribute to environmental pollution that could affect agriculture and directly and/or indirectly affect human health. This proposal will deal specifically with: (1) the distribution of EC waste in the environment and the condition of this waste in various locations in Southern California, including the UCR campus, and (2) the effects of aging on the composition of the e-fluids and the leaching of heavy metals from the atomizers into e-fluids using a unique collection of "aged" EC products available in our lab. Objective #1: To collect, inventory, and catalogue EC waste from various sites in southern California and to analyze metals and nicotine in the e-fluid residues in these products. This Objective will clarify the types of waste (batteries, pods, etc) and the types of ECs (disposables, Mods, cig-a-likes) that appear in the environment as waste..Objective #2: To quantify metals and nicotine in e-fluids from used and unused ECs that have been stored in laboratory-controlled conditions for various periods of time up to 10 years and to compare these data from the data collected in field sites in Objective #1.
Project Methods
Objective #1: Undergraduate students will collect, photograph, inventory and catalogue EC waste found in various field sites in southern California. This will be a longitudinal study that will track the types and amount of waste over the duration of the project. We will determine the main components, products, and brands that comprise EC waste. We will also analyze metals in residual fluids and determine the volumes of fluids in waste products. Samples will be collected on the UCR campus, around high schools and middle schools, in state parks and in other public areas. When we locate hot spots (areas where EC discards are abundant), we will continue to sample those areas over the duration of the project. We will add new hot spots as they are discovered. These data will enable us to model the level of contamination in the environment in Southern California. Specifically, we will be able to categorize the type of ECs (pod, Mod etc.) that are accumulating in the environment, the rate of accumulation, and if accumulation increases as EC use increase. We will also be able to determine which metals are likely to leach into the environment, the condition of the batteries (leaking or intact), and the amount of nicotine that could contaminate soil/water.Objective #2: Metals will be quantified in residual EC fluids using the Perkin-Elmer 7300DV inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometer (ICP-OES), located in Environmental Sciences. Methods for performing ICP-OES have been described previously (Williams et al 2019b). We will assay 10 metals/elements that we have previously shown to be in atomizers and e-fluids that could threaten plant and animal health. Work will begin using a collection of aged ECs that we have maintained in the lab for 10 years. The collection contains both unused and used products, and we have complete records on how much use each product received. This will provide unique information on aging of EC products in controlled laboratory conditions over a 10-year period. Objective #1 will provide metal/element data on samples collected in field sites, and the two sources of data will be compared. We will also begin to age new EC products immediately and follow their fluids over the period of the project to determine which metals accumulate in e-fluid and their rate of accumulation. This will be done by storing multiple samples of each product and removing individual samples for analysis every 6 months over 4 years. The products currently marketed are quite different than those we purchased 10 years ago and so the way in which they age may also differ. Nicotine concentrations will be quantified in samples in this Objective to determine how much nicotine would be released into soil/water when the e-fluid reservoir degrades. Location of work, facilities needed and available: The work will be performed on the UCR campus and in various field sites in southern California. Field samples will be collected on the UCR campus (even though UCR is a tobacco-free campus, numerous EC discards can be found in key hot spots) and in various other sites in Riverside and southern California locations. These include state parks, high schools, and shopping centers. When hot spots are located, they will be revisited periodically to monitor the rate of waste accumulation. Metal analyses will be done at UCR with instrumentation available in the Environmental Science Core. All other procedures will be done at UCR in the Talbot lab.Means of analysis, assessment and interpretation of data: Data in Objective #1 will be stored digitally with three backups of the original data. Data will be analyzed to determine: the type of EC contributing to waste (pod, mod etc.), the locations where waste is found, the rate at which waste accumulates, the concentrations of metals and nicotine in waste products, and the condition of the batteries. In Objective #2, ICP-OES data will be analyzed to determine the concentration of metals/elements in EC products before and during storage in the laboratory. Comparisons of means between storage times will be made using a one-way analysis of variance followed by Dunnett's posthoc test in which each time is compared to the unaged products. For both objectives, the concentrations of metal and nicotine will be compared across product type (pods, mods etc.). We would expect larger more powerful product (such mods) would produce more metal and those with larger reservoirs would be able to release more nicotine and metals. Data from the two Objectives will be cross-compared to determine how laboratory controlled data relate to data collected in field sites.