Impacts of metals and nutrients released from melting multiyear Arctic sea ice

Nutrients (C, N, and P) and metals (iron, molybdenum, nickel, zinc, vanadium, copper, and cobalt) were determined in water and multiyear ice sampled along the Greenland current and Fram Strait in July 2007. Total metal and nutrient concentrations in ice varied fivefold to tenfold, for most elements, across the area sampled. Data show that some nutrients (i.e., NH4+) and metals (i.e., Fe, Zn, V, Cu, Ni, Mo, and Co) are enriched in Arctic ice relative to surface seawaters, suggesting that ice melting is a significant source of metals to the receiving seawaters, particularly Fe and Zn whose concentrations were significantly (t test, P < 0.05) more than 2 orders of magnitude higher in ice than in surface seawater.This research is part of the ATOS project, funded as part of the Spanish contribution to the International Polar Year (IPY) by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (POL2006-00550/CTM). This is a contribution to the GEOTRACES cluster of the IPY. We thank the ATOS participants, UTM and crew of R/V Hespérides for help with ice sampling and logistics. We thank R. Santiago, R. Martínez, and A. Massanet at IMEDEA and J. A. González (SCT, UIB) for help with chemical analyses. This manuscript was written in the field stations of Ses Salines Lighthouse.Peer reviewe

A protocol for wide-scope non-target analysis of contaminants in small amounts of biota using bead beating tissuelyser extraction and LC-HRMS

This work describes a robust and powerful method for wide-scope target and non-target analysis of xenobiotics in biota samples based on bead beating tissuelyser extraction, solid phase extraction (SPE) clean-up and further detection by liquid chromatography coupled to high resolution mass spectrometry (LC-HRMS). Unlike target methodologies, non-target methods usually aim at determining a wide range of still unknown substances with different physicochemical properties. Therefore, losses during the extraction process were minimised. Apart from that, the reduction of possible interferences showed to be necessary to expand the number of compounds that can be detected. This was achieved with an additional SPE clean-up step carried out with mixed-bed multi-layered cartridges. The method was validated with a set of 27 compounds covering a wide range of physicochemical properties, and further applied to the analysis of krill and fish samples. •The bead beating extraction was efficient for a wide range of organic pollutants in small quantities of biota samples. •Multi-layered solid phase extraction clean-up yield a wide xenobiotics coverage reducing matrix effects. •Method validation with 27 compounds led to a suitable method for non-target analysis of organic pollutants in biota.ICRA researchers thank funding from CERCA program. This work has been funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO): project PLAS-MED (CTM2017-89701-C3-2-R). SRM acknowledges the Ramon y Cajal program (RYC-2014-16707). This project has been funded by the Chilean Antarctic Institute through project RT_12_17. The Chilean Agency for Research and Development through the FONDAP initiative (grant no. 15150003) “Centro de Investigación Dinámica de Ecosistemas Marinos de Altas Latitudes (IDEAL)”; and “Anillos de Investigación en Ciencia Antartica (grant no. ANID-PIA-ACT-INACH Anillo ACT192057). IDAEA researchers acknowledge the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (Severo Ochoa, Project CEX2018-000794-S).Peer reviewe

Factors affecting the atmospheric occurrence and deposition of polychlorinated biphenyls in the Southern Ocean

Persistent organic pollutants, such as polychlorinated biphenyls, reach the Southern Ocean atmosphere through long-range atmospheric transport. In this study we report the largest dataset available for the atmospheric occurrence of PCBs in the Southern Ocean surrounding the Antarctic Peninsula from samples obtained during three cruises in 2005, 2008 and 2009. The gas phase concentrations of total PCBs (Sigma;25PCBs) ranged from 1 to 70 pg m-3, while the aerosol phase concentrations were significantly lower (0.04 to 0.4 pg m-3). The aerosol phase is enriched in the more hydrophobic congeners consistent with the model predictions of gas-particle partitioning. There is a net air-to-water diffusive flux of PCBs to the Southern Ocean, up to 100 times higher than the dry deposition flux of aerosol-bound PCBs. The air-water disequilibrium is higher for the more hydrophobic congeners consistent with the role of the biological pump removing PCBs from the water column by settling of PCBs bound to organic matter. The atmospheric half-lives of PCB 52 and 180 are of 3.8 and 1 days, respectively, as calculated from the measured atmospheric concentration and depositional fluxes. The volatilization of PCBs from Antarctic soils during the austral summer drives higher gas phase concentrations in the atmosphere over Antarctica during the warmer periods. This temperature dependence is not observed for PCBs over the adjacent Southern Ocean, probably due to the importance of long-range atmospheric transport and atmospheric deposition modulating the atmospheric occurrence of PCBs. © Author(s) 2013. CC Attribution 3.0 License

Toxicity of natural mixtures of organic pollutants in temperate and polar marine phytoplankton

Semivolatile and persistent organic pollutants (POPs) undergo atmospheric transport before being deposited to the oceans, where they partition to phytoplankton organic matter. The goal of this study was to determine the toxicity of naturally occurring complex mixtures of organic pollutants to temperate and polar phytoplankton communities from the Mediterranean Sea, the North East (NE) Atlantic, and Southern Oceans. The cell abundance of the different phytoplankton groups, chlorophyll a concentrations, viability of the cells, and growth and decay constants were monitored in response to addition of a range of concentrations of mixtures of organic pollutants obtained from seawater extracts. Almost all of the phytoplankton groups were significantly affected by the complex mixtures of non-polar and polar organic pollutants, with toxicity being greater for these mixtures than for single POPs or simple POP mixtures. Cocktails' toxicity arose at concentrations as low as tenfold the field oceanic levels, probably due to a higher chemical activity of the mixture than of simple POPs mixtures. Overall, smaller cells were the most affected, although Mediterranean picophytoplankton was significantly more tolerant to non-polar POPs than picophytoplankton from the Atlantic Ocean or the Bellingshausen Sea microphytoplankton.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the RODA (CTM2004-06842-C03-02/MAR) and ATOS projects (POL2006-00550/CTM) and the European Commission through the SESAME project. P. E., N. B. and C. G.M. acknowledge predoctoral fellowship from the Balearic government, Basque government and Spanish government, respectively.Peer Reviewe

Trends in the monitoring of legacy and emerging organic pollutants in protected areas

Protected Areas (PAs) are locations for conservation, internationally recognized for their natural, ecological, and/or cultural values. Human presence in PAs is generally limited to minimal or banned exploitation of natural resources. However, different threats to PAs are evident as a result of short and long-range transport of organic pollutants of legacy and emerging concern. There has been a shift of interest in legacy pollutants such as persistent organic pollutants (POPs) to emerging compounds, resulting in a need for improved monitoring strategies in PAs. Here, we highlight the main advances in environmental analytical chemistry for legacy and emerging pollution monitoring in PAs. Trends in sampling, sample preparation and instrumental determination of multiclass organic pollutants in biotic and abiotic matrices are presented and discussed. Here, we considered the most relevant and recent literature regarding organic pollutants in PAs from terrestrial to aquatic landscapes collected within 2015 to the present time frame.Fil: Azcune, Germán. Universidad de la República; UruguayFil: Griffero, Luciana. Universidad de la República; UruguayFil: Pareja, Lucía. Universidad de la República; UruguayFil: Rios, Juan Manuel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza. Instituto de Medicina y Biología Experimental de Cuyo; ArgentinaFil: Galbán Malagón, Cristobal. Universidad Mayor.; ChileFil: Perez Parada, Andrés. Universidad de la República; Urugua