About this Research Topic

Background

The usefulness of geochemical maps of chemical elements was initially aimed at mineral prospecting. However with the advancement of environmental awareness, and the strengthening of the principles of sustainability, the elaboration of geochemical maps and efforts to define high-quality geochemical background/baseline values of elements now provide enormous potential to support the monitoring of the effects of anthropogenic actions on the natural environment. This could also lead to the possibility of better quantification of the possible impacts, which is crucial for mitigation actions. Geochemical background values are also being used to develop appropriate guideline/intervention values that will evaluate the environmental risks, and the suitability of cultivation and management, of contaminated water and soil bodies.

To date, only limited regional/national scale research has been carried out concerning the geochemical mapping of potentially toxic elements (PTE) and to define their background/baseline levels in agricultural/urban/mining soils, river sediments and waters. This aspect is of fundamental importance because there is a growing tendency to propose environmental regulatory standards that define reference values for different elements, without taking into account the complex natural reality. We fail to recognize the fact that there are significant variations in the distribution of elements that are unique and directly reflect the natural environment - that is, they are geogenic in character - and which need to be taken into account when defining reference values or baselines for assessing anthropogenic impacts. The knowledge of geochemical backgrounds is important for identifying anomalous values and their sources. Therefore, this topic will scale-up the compressive research on large scale geochemical mapping, and define the background/baseline level of the major contaminants at regional/national scale through advance statistics. This will enable us to evaluate the risk of soil, sediment and water contamination that regions are currently facing and will face in the future. This will also contribute to national/global/continental mapping of PTEs in different environmental compartments.

The topics of particular interest to this project include, but are not limited to (the editors also welcome articles on other related topics, which are closely related to this theme), the following areas:

1. Establishing geochemical background/baseline levels of PTEs and pesticides in agricultural/urban/mining soils, river/stream sediments, and waters;

2. The development of more sophisticated applications and new features, integrating the areas of computing (e.g. database), geoinformation (GIS) computer-base model for achieving better results in the area of geochemical mapping;

3. The integration of multivariate statistics with GIS mapping for defining geochemical background in soil, sediments, and water bodies;

4. The sampling strategies for high/low-density sampling for regional/national/continental-scale mapping;

5. The integration of geology, geomorphology, land use/land cover, and drainage pattern mapping of the region to develop regional-scale mapping;

6. The application of geochemical backgrounds in developing guideline/intervention values that will evaluate the environmental risks and any other management perspectives.

7. Artificial intelligence – machine and deep learning – to model potentially toxic elements (PTE) in soils, sediment, and/or water.

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Classification
• Data Report
• Editorial
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• ... View all formats

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Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Classification
• Data Report
• Editorial
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Policy and Practice Reviews
• Policy Brief
• Review
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: Geochemical mapping, Background/Baseline values, Potentially Toxic Elements; Soil and water management

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