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THE EFFECT OF BIOLOGICAL VARIABILITY ON MONITORING STRATEGIES: METALLOTHIONEINS AS AN EXAMPLE 1
Author(s) -
Engel David W.
Publication year - 1988
Publication title -
jawra journal of the american water resources association
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.957
H-Index - 105
eISSN - 1752-1688
pISSN - 1093-474X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1752-1688.1988.tb03013.x
Subject(s) - callinectes , eastern oyster , whale , biology , estuary , oyster , habitat , sentinel species , ecology , beaked whale , fishery , marine mammal , crassostrea , crustacean
An increasing need exists to determine the relative health of estuarine and coastal systems with respect to their ability to support populations of fishery organisms. Many monitoring programs developed for this purpose utilize physiological and biochemical techniques to determine if marine organisms axe stressed by contaminant exposure. The use of the low molecular weight, metal‐binding protein, metailothionein, is used as a model technique to detect non‐lethal stress in aquatic organisms. Test organisms were the American oyster, Crassostrea virginica , the blue crab, Callinectes sapidus , and the beaked whale, Mesoplodon europaeus . The data presented illustrates how natural environmental and physiological factors can affect the mobilization and partitioning of metals by organisms and contribute to observed variability in data sets. The processes that affected trace metal partitioning and accumulation were: in oysters, the reproductive cycle/season of the year; in blue arabs, growth and the molt cycle; and in the whale, the type of food and habitat. To effectively monitor populations of fishery organisms, therefore, it is necessary to identify those factors that control survival, growth, and reproduction so that better predictive models can be formulated that will not be confounded by uncontrolled variables.