REVIEW ARTICLE Ecotoxicology of glyphosate and recent advances in its mitigation by adsorption Joshua O. Ighalo 1,2 & Oluwaseun Jacob Ajala 3,4 & Adewale George Adeniyi 1 & Esther O. Babatunde 1 & Mary A. Ajala 1 Received: 8 April 2020 /Accepted: 2 November 2020 # Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020 Abstract Glyphosate (N-[phosphonomethyl]glycine) is one of the most popular herbicides now used in agricultural practice. The aim of this paper was to discuss the research progress and innovations in recent years on the mitigation of glyphosate (GLY) from aqueous media by adsorption. The ecotoxicology of GLY was discussed in the domain of its chronic and sub-chronic toxicity, genotoxicity, reproductive toxicity, and carcinogenicity, and potential risks of food contamination were discussed. It was observed that polymers and resins are the best class of adsorbents for GLY adsorption from aqueous media. GLY adsorption was best fit to either Freundlich or Langmuir isotherm depending on the nature of the adsorbent. The pseudo-second-order kinetics was also the best fit for modelling the kinetics of GLY adsorption. A review of the thermodynamics revealed that GLY adsorption was usually spontaneous and exothermic. Research trends and knowledge gaps are in the area of chemical mobility in environmental systems (especially in the presence of other chemical species), the use of heavy metal-laden adsorbent and molecular modelling. Furthermore, it was observed that the ecotoxicology of GLY still has some contentious areas where there is no conclusive stance. Keywords Adsorption . Ecotoxicology . Environment . Glyphosate . Water pollution Introduction Due to urbanisation and industrialisation, water pollution is now one of the major environmental challenges of the twenty- first century (Ighalo and Adeniyi 2020). There is now the release of a diversity of emerging pollutants in the aqueous environment (Jeirani et al. 2017). These pollutants are toxic to humans, animals, and plants (Bai and Ogbourne 2016; Cherik et al. 2015; Jaishankar et al. 2014). Herbicides and pesticides are a class of emerging pollutants now used due to the mechanisation of agriculture (Hoppin et al. 2006). One of the most popular types is glyphosate (Richmond 2018). Glyphosate (N-[phosphonomethyl]glycine) is a white crystal- line powder with a molar mass of 169.07 g/mol. More details of the basic description of the compound are given in Table 1. Glyphosate (GLY) is a highly effective, anionic, non- selective herbicide popularly utilised in agricultural practice (Zhou et al. 2017). It was introduced into the global market Responsible Editor: Philippe Garrigues * Oluwaseun Jacob Ajala oluwaseun_ajala81@yahoo.com Joshua O. Ighalo oshea.ighalo@yahoo.com Adewale George Adeniyi adeniyi.ag@unilorin.edu.ng Esther O. Babatunde babatunde.eo@unilorin.edu.ng Mary A. Ajala ajala.ma@unilorin.edu.ng 1 Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Technology, University of Ilorin, P. M. B 1515, Ilorin, Nigeria 2 Department of Chemical Engineering, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, P. M. B. 5025, Awka, Nigeria 3 Department of Industrial Chemistry, Faculty of Physical Sciences, University of Ilorin, P. M. B. 1515, Ilorin, Nigeria 4 Department of Pure and Applied Chemistry, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, P. M. B. 4000, Ogbomoso, Nigeria Environmental Science and Pollution Research https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-11521-5