The growing global concern over pollution and its substantial effects on ecosystems and human health has emphasized the critical need for a deeper chemical understanding of our environment. Consequently, there is an urgent need to enhance risk assessment, prompting a focus on advanced analytical techniques. Mass Spectrometry Imaging (MSI) is emerging as a prominent tool in this arena since MSI not only maps the spatial biodistribution of pollutants and their transformation products in tissues of living organisms but also gives information on how these pollutants alter the distribution of various molecules within the tissues. This review aims to provide insights into the potential role of MSI in environmental toxicology by first exploring the versatility of the most relevant MSI techniques in revealing the spatial distribution of pollutants and endogenous biomolecules. Also, the current applications of MSI in environmental studies in addition to a critical evaluation of the future perspectives of MSI in the field are discussed. Overall, despite current limitations, MSI shows substantial promise in enhancing risk assessment, and contributes to the increasing adoption of spatial biology in environmental studies.

This research is part of the M4i research program supported by the Dutch Province of Limburg through the LINK program. The authors acknowledge financial support for this study from the EU Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the MSCA-FoodTraNet project (grant agreement no. 956265). IDAEA research has received funding from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033, Grants PID2021–122929OB-C33 and CEX2018–000794-S. AMP also acknowledges a grant PRE2020–094656 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 by ESF Investing in your future. The authors acknowledge BioRender for providing the tools to create the illustrations included in this work.

Peer reviewed