Advanced Degradation and Remediation Strategies for Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFASs): Challenges and Future Perspectives

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are persistent aquatic contaminants whose strong C-F bonds make conventional water treatment ineffective. This review critically synthesizes recent progress in aqueous PFAS degradation through four mechanistic routes: oxidation-driven, biodegradation, reduction-driven, and nonradical processes. Rather than evaluating technologies by parent-compound disappearance alone, we compare their defluorination and mineralization capacities, matrix tolerance, byproduct risks, energy demand, operational stability, and technology readiness. Oxidative and reductive systems can promote rapid degradation or defluorination, but their performance is often constrained by radical/electron quenching, incomplete mineralization, and sensitivity to PFAS structure and water chemistry. Biodegradation and enzymatic approaches offer mild transformation pathways but remain limited by slow kinetics, narrow substrate specificity, and uncertain toxicity evolution. Nonradical and thermochemical processes show stronger potential for deep destruction, particularly in concentrated PFAS streams. Overall, electrochemical oxidation, plasma treatment, and thermal/supercritical oxidation appear closer to practical implementation for spent adsorbents, regenerants, industrial concentrates, and other high-strength wastes, whereas many photocatalytic, biological, and microdroplet systems remain laboratory-stage. Future research should prioritize integrated separation-destruction treatment trains and standardized metrics including total organic fluorine removal, fluoride release, final residual PFAS concentrations relative to regulatory thresholds, transformation-product toxicity, energy consumption, and life-cycle impacts.