Veterinary antibiotic (VA) oxytetracycline (OTC) is an important medicine used in the confined animal feeding operations (CAFO) to help produce healthy animals for meat and dairy. However, recently a great many studies reported widespread antimicrobial resistance due to consistent provenance of VAs in soil, surface water, and waste water. Among the concerns of environmental effects of VAs, almost no studies evaluated the effects on nutrient cycling. Availability of plant micronutrients, especially the ones with a narrow range of availability and toxicity, can be affected by competitive retention mechanisms on soils. Here we propose to investigate the competitive retention mechanism of boron (B) and OTC on a Tennessee soil (6-12 inch) using macroscopic sorption studies, and in situ attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopic tools to understand the surface interaction mechanisms under a range of solution properties. Preliminary results suggested that Tennessee soil has high affinity for OTC and the retention mechanism was very similar to that of iron oxide minerals. Retention of B on Tennessee soil was affected by the presence of OTC. Direct evidence from our FTIR results suggested that the surface complexation of OTC on soil occurred via the – CONH2, - N(CH3)2, and phenolic- OH functional groups. In addition, major IR bands indicated that B sorption was due to trigonal-B(OH)3 surface complex on soil. Currently, there are ongoing experiments to identify the influence of OTC on B surface complexation on soil under different solution properties.

Influence of oxytetracycline antibiotic on the surface complexation mechanism of boron on Tennessee soil: A macroscopic and in situ ATR-FTIR study

ACS Fall 2021

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