A Ten-Year Surveillance of PCDD/Fs and PCBs in Raw Milk from Bovine, Ovine, and Caprine Farms in a Peri-Industrial Area of Southern Italy.

Authors

Conforti Virginia, Capuozzo Flavia, Dimuccio Michela Maria, Basile Fabrizio, Franco Ettore, Pellegrino Angelo, Bonerba Elisabetta, Dambrosio Angela, Ceci Edmondo, Quaglia Cristiana Nicoletta, Bozzo Giancarlo

Published in

Environmental research. Pages 125531. Aug 22, 2026. Epub Aug 22, 2026.

Abstract

Polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and dibenzofurans (PCDD/Fs) and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) remain among the most persistent threats to food safety in peri-industrial agropastoral systems, yet long-term, multi-species surveillance data capable of disentangling environmental, biological, and regulatory determinants of contamination remain relatively scarce in the European literature. This study presents results from a ten-year monitoring program (2016-2025) of PCDD/Fs and PCBs in raw milk from bovine, ovine, and caprine farms reared within the industrially impacted territory of Taranto, southern Italy. A total of 671 samples were analyzed by high-resolution gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, and contamination dynamics were modeled using linear mixed-effects regression accounting for farm distance from the industrial perimeter, animal species, and sampling year. PCBs exhibited a significant inverse relationship with distance, whereas pure PCDD/Fs showed no measurable spatial gradient, a pattern consistent with their greater soil persistence and likely reflecting decades-long environmental homogenization. Caprine and ovine milk consistently and substantially exceeded bovine concentrations across all contaminant classes, confirming small ruminants as the most sensitive sentinel species. A significant increasing temporal trend was attributable to sustained soil contamination and to the progressive, deliberate concentration of monitoring on sentinel high-risk holdings. These findings provide a transferable evidentiary basis for species-differentiated, soil-informed surveillance design in European territories affected by legacy industrial contamination.

PMID:
42632555
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 23 Aug 2026.

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