Marine sponges as a powerful tool for trace elements biomonitoring studies in coastal environment

Anna Maria Orani,Aurélie Barats,Emilia Vassileva,Olivier P Thomas

doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2018.04.073

Abstract

In this work, we performed a comparative study on six marine sponge species collected along the French Mediterranean and Irish coasts for their TEs accumulation. Intra and inter-species variabilities were examined. Among the Mediterranean species, Cymbaxinella damicornis accumulates significantly more As and Cu than others sponge species; Chondrilla nucula more Ni and Mo and Acanthella acuta more Ag. Among Irish samples, Hymeniacidon perlevis showed higher accumulation properties for most of TEs in comparison to Halichondria panicea. Bioconcentration Factors were > 1 in all species for most of TEs. This study suggests that TEs bioaccumulation is most likely associated to differences in morphological features and/or to specific bacterial communities associated to different species. The determination of Pb isotope ratios revealed mainly natural Pb sources for Mediterranean and Kilkieran Bay's samples, and rather anthropogenic influence for Belfast samples. This study confirms that sponges represent a powerful tool for biomonitoring studies.

Highlights

The occurrence of trace elements (TEs) in aquatic environments is related to natural sources, and to anthropogenic inputs from industrial activities
Average TEs concentrations according to sampling site, date and sponge species are summarized in Tables 1S and 2S
Intra-species variability The variability of TEs bioaccumulation within a same sponge species can be evaluated with the relative standard deviation (RSD%) calculated from different specimens of the same sponge species

Summary

Introduction

The occurrence of trace elements (TEs) in aquatic environments is related to natural sources, and to anthropogenic inputs from industrial activities. TE contaminations in the marine environment occur worldwide and the assessment of the pollution status is required, leading to the publication of several studies on this subject (Li et al, 2000; Caccia et al, 2003; Fang et al, 2014; Parra et al, 2015; Cabrita et al, 2017; Ashraf et al, 2017). Sediments act as sink and reservoirs of contaminants displaying higher TEs contents and not presenting problems related to short residence time such as for water (Varol, 2011; Liu et al, 2015). An ideal biomonitor should be a natural accumulator of the element of interest and possibly with high concentration factor, in order to highlight possible difference between times or sites (Rainbow, 2002)

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