Measuring bioconcentration factors and rate constants of chemicals in aquatic organisms under conditions of variable water concentrations and short exposure time

Abstract

A novel method, based on iterative numerical integration, is presented for deriving bioconcentration factors and rate constants of chemicals in aquatic organisms from experimental data of bioconcentration tests in which the chemical concentration in the water is variable over time and the test duration is too short to reach steady-state. The method is applied to reported data from fish and plant bioconcentration tests. The results demonstrate that this method can derive bioconcentration factors and rate constants with considerably less experimental error than other methods currently used, thus reducing uncertainty and variability in bioconcentration measurements.