REVIEW article
Front. Mar. Sci.
Sec. Marine Pollution
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmars.2025.1609843
The marine organism toxicity and regulatory policy of brominated flame retardants (BFRs): a review Authors names
Provisionally accepted
- 1Anhui University of Finance and Economics, Bengbu, Anhui Province, China
- 2Ocean University of China, Qingdao, China
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Brominated flame retardants (BFRs) represent the most widely produced and utilized organic flame retardants globally. Compared to terrestrial and freshwater organisms, research on the marine ecotoxicity of BFRs has lagged behind, with no comprehensive review currently synthesizing these studies. Internationally, BFRs have been subjected to regulatory restrictions due to their demonstrated characteristics as persistent organic pollutants. Nevertheless, significant regulatory gaps persist in current BFRs governance frameworks. Addressing this knowledge gap, this paper briefly reviews the distribution of BFRs in the marine environment, while comprehensively reviewing and comparing their toxic effects on marine organisms and summarize toxic mechanisms. Meanwhile, the paper systematically examines global regulatory policies governing BFRs across various nations and proposes recommendations for enhanced regulatory oversight and legislative improvements. Currently, the studies on the marine biological toxicity of three traditional BFRs, namely polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), hexabromocyclododecane (HBCD), and tetrabromobisphenol A, are relatively comprehensive. These BFRs can exert various toxic effects on planktonic, benthic, and nektonic organisms, mainly including growth and development toxicity, reproductive toxicity, immunotoxicity, and neurotoxicity. However, the toxicity studies on novel BFRs, such as decabromodiphenyl ethane, are scarce and urgently need to be initiated. Moreover, researches on the marine biological toxicity mechanisms of BFRs are relatively simplistic, lacking in the characteristics of different BFRs and adverse outcome pathways starting from the molecular level. Within existing global regulatory frameworks, PBDEs, HBCD, and hexabromobiphenyl have been comprehensively prohibited and phased out. However, environmental risk assessments for alternative BFRs remain ongoing, with corresponding legislative actions lagging behind scientific findings.
Keywords: Brominated flame retardants, Toxic Effects, toxic mechanism, marine organisms, Regulatory policy
Received: 11 Apr 2025; Accepted: 30 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zhang, Chen, WANG and Cao. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Sai Cao, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, China
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