Influence of dissolved humic acid on hydrophobic chemical uptake in juvenile rainbow trout

Abstract

This study measured the chemical uptake of three hydrophobic chemicals (1,2,4-trichlorobenzene (1,2,4-TCB), 1,2,3,4,5-pentachlorobenzene (PeCB) and 2,2′,4,4′,6,6′-hexachlorobiphenyl (HCBP) with differing octanol-water partition coefficients (log K ow values of 3.95, 5.05 and 7.55, respectively) in juvenile rainbow trout ( Oncorhynchus mykiss) after 2-day and 4-day aqueous exposures. Because of the affinity of hydrophobic compounds for dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and previous work demonstrating that fish gills take up these three hydrophobic chemicals, we predicted that chemical uptake into the fish would be lowered by the addition of humic acid to the water (1.54, 4.81 and 14.3 mg/l) compared with control fish (no humic acid added to the water). As predicted, humic acid concentrations of ≥4.81 mg/l significantly reduced the whole body concentrations of all three chemicals when compared with 1.54 mg/l humic acid. This effect of humic acid was greatest for HCBP, the chemical with the highest log K ow, such that chemical uptake was reduced by 3.4-fold for 14.3 mg/l humic acid compared with the control exposure. However, an unexpected finding was that, compared with the control exposure, the lowest concentration of humic acid tested (1.54 mg/l humic acid) significantly increased chemical uptake by up to 112% for the two chemicals with the lower log K ow, PeCB and 1,2,4-TCB, and did not affect uptake of the high log K ow chemical HCBP. We conclude that the ability of DOC to inhibit aqueous uptake of hydrophobic chemicals was dependent on both the concentration of DOC and the log K ow of the chemical, but that low humic acid concentrations of approximately 1.5 mg/l can significantly increase uptake of certain chemicals with a log K ow between 4 and 5.