Heavy metals in bivalve mussels and their habitats from different sites along the Chilean Coast

Journal Article · Tue Feb 01 00:00:00 EST 1994 · Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology; (United States)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00198497· OSTI ID:6643174

De Gregori, I; Pinochet, H; Delgado, D ^[1]; Gras, N; Munoz, L ^[2]

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1. Catholic Univ. of Valparaiso (Chile)
2. Nuclear Center La Reina, Santiago (Chile)

It is well known that heavy metals have a great ecological significance due to their toxicity and accumulative behaviour playing a prominent role in marine ecosystems. They occur in all compartments in the marine environment with a tendency to accumulate in organism from different trophic levels of the marine webs. Along this pathway, toxic trace metals become a potential hazard for man and mammals. Coastal and estuarine zones are more vulnerable to anthropogenic pollution with toxic metals and it must be kept in mind that these zones have high seafood production. Chile is in a favourable position to develop fishing activities since it has approximately 4.500 km. of coastline bordering the South Pacific Ocean. The seawater is rich in nutrients and new aquaculture projects have been developed during the last year. However, these seafoods, like other marine organisms, are susceptible to being contaminated by trace metals, produced especially by the mining and industrial processing of ores and metals (i.e., Cu, Mo). This activity is well known as an important source of heavy metals, due to the enormous quantities of waste products, some of which were formerly released directly to the marine environment. Actually there are many aspects demanding better and more detailed knowledge on the occurrence, inventory, of the Chilean marine ecosystem. For these reasons we are developing a programme for monitoring some heavy metals in marine samples. The development of analytical quality control procedures and the analysis of toxic trace elements in fresh and canned mussels were recently published. In this paper, we present the results obtained for the Cadmium, Copper and Zinc contents in water, sediment and mollusc samples collected from different geographical areas located along the coast of Chile. 11 refs., 1 fig., 1 tab.

• OSTI ID: 6643174
• Journal Information: Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology; (United States), Vol. 52:2; ISSN 0007-4861
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
63 RADIATION, THERMAL, AND OTHER ENVIRON. POLLUTANT EFFECTS ON LIVING ORGS. AND BIOL. MAT.
CHILE
COASTAL REGIONS
CONTAMINATION
METALS
BIOLOGICAL ACCUMULATION
ECOLOGICAL CONCENTRATION
MUSSELS
CHEMICAL ANALYSIS
CADMIUM
COPPER
ZINC
ANIMALS
AQUATIC ORGANISMS
DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
ELEMENTS
INVERTEBRATES
LATIN AMERICA
MOLLUSCS
SOUTH AMERICA
TRANSITION ELEMENTS
540320* - Environment
Aquatic- Chemicals Monitoring & Transport- (1990-)
560300 - Chemicals Metabolism & Toxicology