Surface Flooding as a Key Driver of Groundwater Arsenic Contamination in Southeast Asia.

ABSTRACT: Chronic exposure to groundwater contaminated with geogenic arsenic (As) poses a significant threat to human health worldwide, especially for those living on floodplains in South and Southeast (S-SE) Asia. In the alluvial and deltaic aquifers of S-SE Asia, aqueous As concentrations vary sharply over small spatial scales (10-100 m), making it challenging to identify where As contamination is present and mitigate exposure. Improved mechanistic understanding of the factors that control groundwater As levels is essential to develop models that accurately predict spatially variable groundwater As concentrations. Here we demonstrate that surface flooding duration and interannual frequency are master variables that integrate key hydrologic and biogeochemical processes that affect groundwater As le

SUBMITTER: Connolly CT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8766940 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature