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Organophosphate esters (OPEs) widely exist in the environment, raising increasing concerns about their potential health risks. This comprehensive review surveyed the occurrence of OPEs over the last decade in indoor microenvironments (i.e. residence, in-vehicle, office, and school/daycare center), outdoors, foodstuffs, drinking water, and human-related specimen (i.e. breast milk and urine) with a view to unraveling age-specific exposure to OPEs. Multiple exposure pathways including inhalation, dermal absorption, dust ingestion, and dietary ingestion were considered to prioritize their relative importance. The results showed that dietary ingestion was the main contributor, followed by dust ingestion, regardless of age. A healthy diet with less contaminated food can effectively reduce OPE intake. OPE concentrations in air and dust followed the sequence of in-vehicle and office > school/daycare center > residence > outdoors. Compared to other indoor settings, exposure in schools/daycare centers and offices contributed to a greater OPE intake in non-adults and adults, respectively. The estimated daily intake of OPEs followed the sequence of infants > toddlers > children > teenagers > adults > elderlies. Overall, OPEs posed low health risks to all age cohorts, but infants were vulnerable and subject to the highest risk, largely attributed to breast milk ingestion. This review highlights the need for more toxicity and bioaccessibility studies on OPE mixtures and metabolites to further refine the health risk assessment of OPEs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inhalation of size-dependent particle-bound polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) has been extensively studied, whereas dermal absorption has not been adequately investigated. To address this knowledge gap, dermal absorption of size-dependent particle-bound PAHs was characterized through the collection of indoor air and forearm wipe samples in the setting of an indoor barbecue. The mass of size-fractioned PAHs associated with particulate matter was greater in fine particles (<1.8 μm) than in coarse particles (>1.8 μm). Gas-particle distribution of specific PAHs from barbecue fume was ascribed to both adsorption and absorption which would probably be close to equilibrium, while that from background air was dominated by absorption. Forearm-deposited amounts of particulate PAHs suggested that removal of coarse and fine particles could minimize exposure to low and high molecular-weight (MW) PAHs, respectively. Besides, the concentrations of particulate PAHs in forearms wipe were significantly correlated to their dry deposition fluxes with coarse particles, but weakly correlated to those with fine particles. This indicated that particle size would influence dermal absorption efficiency of particle-bound PAHs with fine particles prolonging dermal exposure to PAHs. Overall, higher MW particle-bound PAHs derived from barbecue fume may pose higher risk to human health by dermal absorption than lower MW PAHs. Image 1 • Higher molecular-weight (MW) PAHs derived from barbecue fume have strong tendency to adhere to particles. • Coarse and fine particles dominate the dry deposition of low and high MW particle-bound PAHs on forearms, respectively. • Skin wipe may be a good indicator of coarse particulate PAHs deposited on forearms. Fine particle-bound PAHs derived from barbecue fume may not be easily removed from forearms and may pose higher risk than coarse particle-bound ones by dermal absorption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]