Bioaccumulation

About: Bioaccumulation is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 7112 publications have been published within this topic receiving 208953 citations. The topic is also known as: bioakumulace.

Influence of soot carbon on the bioaccumulation of sediment-bound polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons by marine benthic invertebrates: An interspecies comparison

Abstract: The sorption of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) to soot carbon in marine sediments has been hypothesized to reduce PAH bioavailability. This hypothesis was tested for eight species of marine benthic invertebrates (four polychaete worms, Clymenella torquata, Nereis virens, Cirriformia grandis, and Pectinaria gouldii, and four bivalve mollusks, Macoma balthica, Mulinia lateralis, Yoldia limatula, and Mya arenaria) that span a wide range of feeding behavior, ability to metabolize PAHs, and gut chemistry. Organisms were exposed for 20 d to two PAH-spiked sediments, one with soot and one without soot. The soot treatment generally resulted in lower bioaccumulation than the no soot treatment, though the differences between treatments were not significant for all species. All but one species accumulated significant PAH concentrations in their tissues from the soot treatment, indicating that soot-bound PAH cannot be dismissed as unavailable to infaunal benthic biota. Bioaccumulation factors were correlated negatively to both the organisms' ability to metabolize PAHs and the gut fluid contact angle, supporting the hypotheses that high PAH metabolism results in lower bioaccumulation factors and bioavailability of PAHs may be limited partially by PAH solubilization in the gut lumen. The variability in bioaccumulation due to the soot treatment was much less than the variability between species and between PAH analytes. Comparatively low bioaccumulation was observed in Nereis virens, a species commonly used in bioaccumulation tests. These results suggest that more effort is needed in understanding the salient characteristics of species present in a threatened environment, rather than focusing solely on the sediment geochemistry (e.g., soot and organic carbon content) and contaminant characteristics when predicting ecological risk of PAH-contaminated sediments.

Bioaccumulation of Total Mercury and Monomethylmercury in the Earthworm Eisenia Fetida

Abstract: Bioaccumulation factors (BAFs) for inorganic mercury in earthworms are usually < 1; however, factors up to ∼10 have been reported. Little information is available concerning the bioaccumulation of organic mercury in earthworms from actual contaminated soils and thus there has been uncertainty in the risk characterization phase of ecological risk assessments of mercury-contaminated sites. This study was initiated to determine the rate of uptake and bioaccumulation of total mercury (T-Hg) and monomethylmercury (MMHg) in Eisenia fetida from soils which have been contaminated with mercury for approximately 30 years. The study consisted of a 28-day uptake phase in three mercury-contaminated soils and one soil with background concentrations of mercury followed by a 14-day depuration phase in background soil only. Total mercury concentrations in the study soils ranged from 85 to 11,542 μg kg−1 dry weight soil; MMHg concentrations ranged from 1.12 to 7.35 μg kg−1 dry weight soil. Time to 90% steady states for T-Hg ranged from 36 to 42 days. A steady state did not occur for any of the MMHg exposures during the 42-day study; estimated time to 90% steady state varied from 97 to 192 days. BAFs for T-Hg ranged from 0.6 to 3.3. BAFs for MMHg ranged from 175 to 249. The BAFs for T-Hg and MMHg were larger in earthworms exposed to the lower contaminated soils and smaller in the higher mercury-contaminated soils. The absolute concentrations of T-Hg and MMHg bioaccumulated in E. fetida, however, were higher in the earthworms exposed to the higher mercury soils and lower in the less mercury-contaminated soils.