Environmental pollution from flame retardants (FR) has attracted increasing attention from the public and scientific community. Aside from well-known legacy FRs such as halogenated diphenyl ethers, more and more emerging FR pollutants are being identified, such as non-brominated and phosphate ester compounds. These emerging FRs are mostly used as an alternative substance in consumer products in replacement of legacy pollutants. In many countries, emerging pollutants are either unregulated or inadequately regulated. Also, their prevalence, toxicity, and fate remain to be comprehensively described compared to legacy pollutants.

A number of FRs are known to be bio-accumulative, persistent, and bio-magnify in the food chain. Environmental pollution associated with these chemicals has therefore been identified as a global environmental issue due to their toxicity to biotic communities. It is important and urgent to investigate the fate, sources, and toxicity mechanisms of these chemicals in multiple environmental matrices to provide a better understanding of their impact on environmental and human health. Additionally, the health risk estimation and development of remediation technology to control the exposure risk of these chemicals would provide insight into the elimination of FRs from the environment.

This Research Topic focuses on various studies of legacy and emerging FR pollutants. Potential topics include, but are not limited to

• the identification of legacy and emerging FRs and their derivatives;
• the environmental occurrences and characteristics of legacy and emerging FRs;
• toxicity mechanisms of flame retardants and their impact on environmental and human health;
• environmental risk assessment; and
• source apportionment, analytical methodology, and control of legacy and emerging FR pollutants.

We welcome submissions from all researchers working in this field. Available article types include original research, reviews, mini-reviews, and perspectives.

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Frontiers in Environmental Science

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