Acute toxic effect of typical chemicals and ecological risk assessment based on two marine microalgae, Phaeodactylum tricornutum and Platymonas subcordiformis

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.etap.2021.103649Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Nonylphenol, butyl acrylate and 1, 2-dichloroethane were toxic to P. tricornutum and P. subcordiformis.

  • Obtaining the 96 h-ECx values of three HNS on two marine microalgae.

  • The ecological risk of Nonylphenol was greater than that of 1, 2-dichloroethane.

Abstract

With the increasing demand for typical hazardous and noxious substances (HNS) in chemical industry, there is an increased leakage risk of these HNS during transportation by vessel and storage nearby seashore. In this study, the acute toxicity of nonylphenol, butyl acrylate and 1, 2-dichloroethane to Phaeodactylum tricornutum (P. tricornutum) and Platymonas subcordiformis (P. subcordiformis), was investigated to assess their ecological risk. The results showed that the three kinds of HNS showed significant time- and dose-dependent patterns on the growth inhibition of two marine microalgae. The 96 h-EC50 of nonylphenol, butyl acrylate and 1, 2-dichloroethane on P. tricornutum was 1.088, 45.908 and 396 mg L−1, respectively, and the 96 h-EC50 of that on P. subcordiformis was 0.851, 52.621 and 389 mg L−1, respectively. It was a common method to evaluate the harm of pollutants to organisms by calculating HC5 value (the minimum pollutant concentration value harmful to 95 % of the studied species, which was no-effect concentration) with Species Sensitivity Distribution (SSD). On the basis of EC50, the ecological risk assessment was further carried out, and HC5 value of nonylphenol and 1, 2-dichloroethane to aquatic organism was 0.079 and 44 mg L−1, respectively.

Introduction

With the continuous development of chemical industry, the marine transportation volumes and types of chemicals have been increasing (Mccay et al., 2006). It was reported that the quantity of marine chemical transportation rose with an annual trade of 215 million tons worldwide (Harold et al., 2014). Accordingly, explosion and leakage accidents of chemicals also increase dramatically during transportation and storage (EMSA). It is acknowledged that the most kinds of chemicals are hazardous and noxious substances (HNS), which have been proved to be detrimental to organisms, humans, and environment (Cunha et al., 2017; Liu et al., 2015). Many experts and scholars have paid more attention to the ecological risk of leaked HNS for the aquatic ecological environment and aquatic organism (Neuparth et al., 2014; Radović et al., 2012; Neuparth et al., 2011). After the explosion accident of chemical at Tianjin Port, 2015, the 12th Five Year Plan for the prevention and control of chemical environmental risk was specially issued by the state, in China.

Nonylphenol, butyl acrylate and 1, 2-dichloroethane, belong to HNS, are all included the list of 12th Five Year Plan of chemical environmental risk prevention and control and have also been listed in the top 50 chemicals that most likely to be involved in HNS spill incident by International Maritime Organization (ITOPF, 2014). It was reported that nonylphenol was one of the most widely used and effective classes of nonionic surfactants in industrial, institutional, commercial and household applications (Gao et al., 2011). 1,2-dichloroethane was mainly used in the production of adhesives, solvents and chlorinated hydrocarbons. Accidental poisoning events caused by 1,2-dichloroethane occurred from time to time, and there is a risk of carcinogenesis that cannot be ignored (Pan and Ye, 2016). These dangerous chemicals used in many aspects are transportation by vessel and stored nearby seashore, which have a great risk of leakage. What they once leaked into the marine environment would cause tremendous damage to the marine ecosystem and marine organism. However, there were few information on the toxicity of three HNS to marine organisms and the state had not yet established a toxicity database for HNS’s ecological risk assessment on marine organisms at present. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out toxicity study of the three HNS on the marine organisms.

As the primary producer of aquatic ecosystem, microalgae, with wide distribution and many species, play an irreplaceable role in maintaining the stability and balance of aquatic ecosystem (Zhang and Tang, 2013; Faithfull et al., 2011). Phaeodactylum tricornutum (P. tricornutum) and Platymonas subcordiformis (P. subcordiformis) both are marine unicellular microalgae, are natural bait for fish, shrimp, shellfish and other maricultural organisms, with the character of easy to cultivate and sensitive to pollutant (Zhao et al., 2019). The quality of algae was closely related to the survival rate, growth rate and disease resistance of aquatic animals (Sicko-Goad, 1982; Fisher, 1985; Sarmento and Gasol, 2012; Lin et al., 2010). Thus, the characteristics of P. tricornutum and P. subcordiformis that made them to be ideal materials in ecotoxicology experiments.

This paper, which has investigated the acute toxic effect of nonylphenol, butyl acrylate and 1,2-dichloroethane and ecological risk assessment based on two marine microalgae, P. tricornutum and P. subcordiformis, has two purposes: one was to elucidate the toxicity effect of three HNS on the growth of two marine microalgae. The other was attempt to assess the ecological risks of nonylphenol and 1,2-dichloroethane to the whole aquatic organism by HC5 value (the minimum pollutant concentration value harmful to 95 % of the studied species, which was no-effect concentration) instead of predicted no-effect concentrations (PNECs). These results of this paper could provide preliminary toxic data for three HNS and could also enrich the ecological risk HC5 value of typical HNS that useful to provide data reference for emergency response work after HNS polluted into the sea.

Section snippets

Experimental species and culture conditions

The P. tricornutum and P. subcordiformis were both provided by the Lab of Applied Microalgae Biology of Ocean University of China (Yushan, Qingdao, China). They were cultured in 250 mL Erlenmeyer flasks with 100 mL F/2 medium (Lananan et al., 2013), respectively.

The culture Erlenmeyer flask was placed in a constant temperature light incubator, the temperature was (20 ± 1) ℃, the light intensity was 80 μmol m−2·s−1 (12 h:12 h light: dark cycle), the salinity was 31 ± 1, and the pH was 8.0 ± 0.5.

Effects of three HNS on the growth of P. tricornutum

Three kinds of HNS all have inhibitory effect on the growth of P. tricornutum and the inhibitory effect is gradually strengthened with the increase of concentration (Fig. 1). For example, after 96 h, the inhibition rate of nonylphenol on P. tricornutum was 5.23 %, 13.65 %, 20.21 %, 31.84 % and 55.69 % at 0.075, 0.15, 0.3, 0.6 and 1.2 mg L−1 group, respectively (Fig. 1A1). Similarly, the inhibition rate of butyl acrylate on P. tricornutum was 4.36 %, 13.55 %, 24.99 %, 55.33 % and 75.77 % at

Discussion

Aquatic organisms such as algae, crustaceans, shellfish and fish belong to different trophic levels of aquatic ecosystem. Hazardous chemicals can not only threaten the organism of the low trophic levels, but also threaten the organism of high trophic level through the enrichment of food chain (Kirby and Law, 2010). Previous research reported that 96 h-LC50 of nonylphenol on Mytilus edulis, Americamysis bahia, Salmo salar was 3, 0.05 and 0.9 mg L−1, respectively (Granmo et al., 1989; Hirano et

Conclusion

In this study, the 96 h-EC50 of nonylphenol, butyl acrylate and 1, 2-dichloroethane on P. tricornutum was 1.088, 45.908 and 396 mg L−1, respectively, and the 96 h-EC50 of them on P. subcordiformis was 0.851, 52.621 and 389 mg L−1, respectively. The results showed that nonylphenol was extremely toxic to both microalgae, butyl acrylate was moderate toxic to both microalgae, and 1,2-dichloroethane was low toxic to both microalgae. The SSD curves of nonylphenol and 1,2-dichloroethane to aquatic

Author contributions

Xiufen Wang: Data curation, Writing- Original draft preparation, Validation.

Yun Li: Supervision, Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing.

Shouxiang Wei: Software.

Luqing Pan: Project administration; Conceptualization.

Jingjing Miao: Software, Conceptualization.

Yufei Lin: Funding acquisition.

Jiangyue Wu: Funding acquisition.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Development Fund Project of Key Laboratory of Marine Oil Spill Identification and Damage Assessment Technology of State Oceanic Administration, People's Republic of China (201805); and the National Marine Hazard Mitigation Service, State Oceanic Administration, People's Republic of China (2016AA061).

References (44)

  • X.F. Wang et al.

    Toxicity assessment of p-choroaniline on Platymonas subcordiformis and its biodegradation

    Ecotox. Environ. Safe.

    (2020)
  • X. Xu et al.

    Probe into the method of regional ecological risk assessment—a case study of wetland in the yellow river delta in china

    J. Environ. Manage.

    (2004)
  • X. Zhao et al.

    Toxicity of BDE-47, BDE-99 and BDE-153 on swimming behavior of the unicellular marine microalgae Platymonas subcordiformis and implications for seawater quality assessment

    Environ. Safe.

    (2019)
  • L. Zheng et al.

    Application of a series of biomarkers in Scallop Chlamys farreri to assess the toxic effects after exposure to a priority hazardous and noxious substance (HNS)-Acrylonitrile

    Environ. Toxicol. Phar.

    (2018)
  • D.J. Caldwell et al.

    Derivation of an aquatic predicted no-effect concentration for the synthetic hormone, 17α-ethinyl estradiol

    Environ. Sci. Technol.

    (2008)
  • CECJR, Centre European Commission Joint Research

    Technical Guidance Document on Risk-Assessment (EB/OL) [R]

    (2011)
  • I. Cunha et al.

    Using early life stages of marine animals to screen the toxicity of priority hazardous and noxious substances

    Environ. Sci. Pollut. R.

    (2017)
  • EMSA, European Maritime Safety Agency website. Available at: http://www.emsa.europa.eu/. (Accessed 14 July...
  • C.L. Faithfull et al.

    Bottom–up carbon subsidies and top–down predation pressure interact to affect aquatic food web structure

    Oikos

    (2011)
  • B. Fang et al.

    Toxicity evaluation of 4,4′-di-cdps and 4,4′-di-cde on green algae scenedesmus obliquus: growth inhibition, change in pigment content, and oxidative stress

    Environ. Sci. Pollut. R.

    (2018)
  • N.S. Fisher

    Accumulation of metals by marine picoplankton

    Marine Biology (Berlin)

    (1985)
  • B. Freedman

    Environmental Science: A Canadian Perspective

    (1998)
  • Cited by (5)

    • Salinity fluctuation influences the toxicity of 1-octyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride ([C<inf>8</inf>mim]Cl) to a marine diatom Phaeodactylum tricornutum

      2022, Marine Pollution Bulletin
      Citation Excerpt :

      For example, P. tricornutum was selected as a model species of marine diatoms to investigate the toxic effects of fluoranthene and copper at population level (effect on growth) and subcellular level (effect on ultrastructure) (Wang and Zheng, 2008). Moreover, Wang et al. (2021) used P. tricornutum to assess the ecological risk and acute toxicity of nonylphenol, butyl acrylate, and 1,2-dichloroethane. Thus, P. tricornutum is a suitable organism in ecotoxicology tests because of its wonderful features.

    • The microalgae Chaetoceros tenuissimus exposed to contaminants of emerging concern: A potential alternative to standardized species for marine quality assessment

      2022, Ecological Indicators
      Citation Excerpt :

      Their turnover rate is 10 times faster than that of multicellular aquatic producers (Shurin et al., 2006). Because physical and chemical impacts on aquatic ecosystems can have bottom-up effects for organisms higher in the trophic web (Li et al., 2020), phytoplankton have long been used as an effective bio-indicator of environmental quality (Parmar et al., 2016; Rao et al., 2018), for instance, water, effluent waste quality, and environmental risk (Gomaa et al., 2021; Wang et al., 2021). Generally, organisms for a bioassay should be widespread in an ecosystem, ecologically relevant, sensitive to contaminants, and easy to handle and maintain in the laboratory (EPA, 1991; Mecozzi et al., 2008; Luan et al., 2020).

    • Toxicity of 2, 2′, 4, 4′-tetrabromodiphenyl ether (BDE-47) on the green microalgae Chlorella sp. and the role of cellular oxidative stress

      2022, Marine Pollution Bulletin
      Citation Excerpt :

      The 96 h-EC50 of BDE-47 to Chlorella sp. was 64.7 μg L−1, which is relatively low compared to numerous marine organic pollutants. According to reports, the 96 h-EC50 values of perfluorinated compounds (PFCs), phenol and dichloroethane on microalgae were all 101–103 mg L−1 (Xu et al., 2013; Duan et al., 2017; Lv et al., 2020; Wang et al., 2021); for bisphenol a (BPA) and tetrabromobisphenol A (TBBPA), the 96 h-EC50 values were 10−1-101 mg L−1(Wang et al., 2013; Rosal et al., 2010). However, some pollutants exhibited comparable or lower EC50 values than BDE-47 like triclosan and herbicide terbutryn (10−2 mg L−1) (Khatikarn et al., 2018; Rioboo et al., 2002).

    View full text