Benthic foraminifera geochemistry as a monitoring tool for heavy metal and phosphorus pollution — A post fish-farm removal case study

Shai Oron; Aleksey Sadekov; Timor Katz; Beverly Goodman-Tchernov

doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2021.112443

Benthic foraminifera geochemistry as a monitoring tool for heavy metal and phosphorus pollution — A post fish-farm removal case study

Shai Oron, Aleksey Sadekov, Timor Katz, Beverly Goodman-Tchernov

Department of Marine Geosciences

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

Measuring environmental contaminants in coastal areas is critical for monitoring and managing their impacts. Commonly used techniques involve repetitive field sampling, which provides a single moment in time during each effort. In this study, we examine the potential for using foraminifera in monitoring and risk assessment as recorders of bioavailable pollutants. Geochemical analysis of benthic foraminifera (Operculina ammonoides) shells sampled annually at a previous fish farm location showed extremely high levels of copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), and phosphorus (P) during the three years following the fish cages removal, with a general reduction afterwards. Levels of Cu/Ca were still more than 4-fold higher than background levels 10 years after the removal of the fish cages. Based on our finds, it is concluded that the geochemical analysis of recent benthic foraminifera shells can serve as a powerful monitoring tool of bioavailable contaminants in seawater. Additionally, the results highlight the need for heavy metal monitoring near marine aquaculture facilities and suggest that long-term effects extend spatially and temporally far beyond the original point source. Finally, we observed variations in micro-distribution of elements within the top 1–2 μm of the shells, where Cu/Ca, Zn/Ca and P/Ca are consistently higher in the chamber wall than in the septa. This observation is relevant for studies conducting single chamber analyses.

Original language	English
Article number	112443
Journal	Marine Pollution Bulletin
Volume	168
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2021.112443
State	Published - Jul 2021

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
We gratefully acknowledge the work of all collaborators involved in the previous work done in the study site, as part of the archive collection of samples used in this study (Sigal Abramovich, Dror Angel, Gily Merkado, and Moshe Kiflawi). We thank Yoni Shaked and Irina Kolesnikova from the National Monitoring Program. We are grateful for the support of the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat, in particular the dive center and administrative staff. We are thankful to A. Suvorova at Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis at UWA and to C.J. Everhardt at the Department of Marine Geosciences, University of Haifa for assistance with SEM imaging. We appreciatively acknowledge the sampling and analysis work done by all participants of the 2018 and 2019 Marine Sedimentology course. This work was also supported by the Israel Ministry of Science and Technology through the Yitzhak Navon scholarships for female students living in the socio-economic periphery (3-15369), the Australian Research Council through the Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (CE140100020) and by Sir Mick Davis and Norman Krischer. We thank the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of our manuscript and their insightful suggestions.

Funding Information:
We gratefully acknowledge the work of all collaborators involved in the previous work done in the study site, as part of the archive collection of samples used in this study (Sigal Abramovich, Dror Angel, Gily Merkado, and Moshe Kiflawi). We thank Yoni Shaked and Irina Kolesnikova from the National Monitoring Program. We are grateful for the support of the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat, in particular the dive center and administrative staff. We are thankful to A. Suvorova at Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis at UWA and to C.J. Everhardt at the Department of Marine Geosciences, University of Haifa for assistance with SEM imaging. We appreciatively acknowledge the sampling and analysis work done by all participants of the 2018 and 2019 Marine Sedimentology course. This work was also supported by the Israel Ministry of Science and Technology through the Yitzhak Navon scholarships for female students living in the socio-economic periphery ( 3-15369 ), the Australian Research Council through the Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies ( CE140100020 ) and by Sir Mick Davis and Norman Krischer . We thank the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of our manuscript and their insightful suggestions.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier Ltd

Keywords

Benthic foraminifera
Bio-indicator
Fish-farms
Heavy metals
LA-ICPMS
Phosphorous

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Oceanography
Aquatic Science
Pollution

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Access to Document

10.1016/j.marpolbul.2021.112443

Cite this

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title = "Benthic foraminifera geochemistry as a monitoring tool for heavy metal and phosphorus pollution — A post fish-farm removal case study",

abstract = "Measuring environmental contaminants in coastal areas is critical for monitoring and managing their impacts. Commonly used techniques involve repetitive field sampling, which provides a single moment in time during each effort. In this study, we examine the potential for using foraminifera in monitoring and risk assessment as recorders of bioavailable pollutants. Geochemical analysis of benthic foraminifera (Operculina ammonoides) shells sampled annually at a previous fish farm location showed extremely high levels of copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), and phosphorus (P) during the three years following the fish cages removal, with a general reduction afterwards. Levels of Cu/Ca were still more than 4-fold higher than background levels 10 years after the removal of the fish cages. Based on our finds, it is concluded that the geochemical analysis of recent benthic foraminifera shells can serve as a powerful monitoring tool of bioavailable contaminants in seawater. Additionally, the results highlight the need for heavy metal monitoring near marine aquaculture facilities and suggest that long-term effects extend spatially and temporally far beyond the original point source. Finally, we observed variations in micro-distribution of elements within the top 1–2 μm of the shells, where Cu/Ca, Zn/Ca and P/Ca are consistently higher in the chamber wall than in the septa. This observation is relevant for studies conducting single chamber analyses.",

keywords = "Benthic foraminifera, Bio-indicator, Fish-farms, Heavy metals, LA-ICPMS, Phosphorous",

author = "Shai Oron and Aleksey Sadekov and Timor Katz and Beverly Goodman-Tchernov",

note = "Funding Information: We gratefully acknowledge the work of all collaborators involved in the previous work done in the study site, as part of the archive collection of samples used in this study (Sigal Abramovich, Dror Angel, Gily Merkado, and Moshe Kiflawi). We thank Yoni Shaked and Irina Kolesnikova from the National Monitoring Program. We are grateful for the support of the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat, in particular the dive center and administrative staff. We are thankful to A. Suvorova at Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis at UWA and to C.J. Everhardt at the Department of Marine Geosciences, University of Haifa for assistance with SEM imaging. We appreciatively acknowledge the sampling and analysis work done by all participants of the 2018 and 2019 Marine Sedimentology course. This work was also supported by the Israel Ministry of Science and Technology through the Yitzhak Navon scholarships for female students living in the socio-economic periphery (3-15369), the Australian Research Council through the Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (CE140100020) and by Sir Mick Davis and Norman Krischer. We thank the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of our manuscript and their insightful suggestions. Funding Information: We gratefully acknowledge the work of all collaborators involved in the previous work done in the study site, as part of the archive collection of samples used in this study (Sigal Abramovich, Dror Angel, Gily Merkado, and Moshe Kiflawi). We thank Yoni Shaked and Irina Kolesnikova from the National Monitoring Program. We are grateful for the support of the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat, in particular the dive center and administrative staff. We are thankful to A. Suvorova at Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis at UWA and to C.J. Everhardt at the Department of Marine Geosciences, University of Haifa for assistance with SEM imaging. We appreciatively acknowledge the sampling and analysis work done by all participants of the 2018 and 2019 Marine Sedimentology course. This work was also supported by the Israel Ministry of Science and Technology through the Yitzhak Navon scholarships for female students living in the socio-economic periphery ( 3-15369 ), the Australian Research Council through the Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies ( CE140100020 ) and by Sir Mick Davis and Norman Krischer . We thank the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of our manuscript and their insightful suggestions. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2021 Elsevier Ltd",

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AU - Goodman-Tchernov, Beverly

N1 - Funding Information: We gratefully acknowledge the work of all collaborators involved in the previous work done in the study site, as part of the archive collection of samples used in this study (Sigal Abramovich, Dror Angel, Gily Merkado, and Moshe Kiflawi). We thank Yoni Shaked and Irina Kolesnikova from the National Monitoring Program. We are grateful for the support of the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat, in particular the dive center and administrative staff. We are thankful to A. Suvorova at Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis at UWA and to C.J. Everhardt at the Department of Marine Geosciences, University of Haifa for assistance with SEM imaging. We appreciatively acknowledge the sampling and analysis work done by all participants of the 2018 and 2019 Marine Sedimentology course. This work was also supported by the Israel Ministry of Science and Technology through the Yitzhak Navon scholarships for female students living in the socio-economic periphery (3-15369), the Australian Research Council through the Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (CE140100020) and by Sir Mick Davis and Norman Krischer. We thank the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of our manuscript and their insightful suggestions. Funding Information: We gratefully acknowledge the work of all collaborators involved in the previous work done in the study site, as part of the archive collection of samples used in this study (Sigal Abramovich, Dror Angel, Gily Merkado, and Moshe Kiflawi). We thank Yoni Shaked and Irina Kolesnikova from the National Monitoring Program. We are grateful for the support of the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat, in particular the dive center and administrative staff. We are thankful to A. Suvorova at Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis at UWA and to C.J. Everhardt at the Department of Marine Geosciences, University of Haifa for assistance with SEM imaging. We appreciatively acknowledge the sampling and analysis work done by all participants of the 2018 and 2019 Marine Sedimentology course. This work was also supported by the Israel Ministry of Science and Technology through the Yitzhak Navon scholarships for female students living in the socio-economic periphery ( 3-15369 ), the Australian Research Council through the Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies ( CE140100020 ) and by Sir Mick Davis and Norman Krischer . We thank the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of our manuscript and their insightful suggestions. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 Elsevier Ltd

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AB - Measuring environmental contaminants in coastal areas is critical for monitoring and managing their impacts. Commonly used techniques involve repetitive field sampling, which provides a single moment in time during each effort. In this study, we examine the potential for using foraminifera in monitoring and risk assessment as recorders of bioavailable pollutants. Geochemical analysis of benthic foraminifera (Operculina ammonoides) shells sampled annually at a previous fish farm location showed extremely high levels of copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), and phosphorus (P) during the three years following the fish cages removal, with a general reduction afterwards. Levels of Cu/Ca were still more than 4-fold higher than background levels 10 years after the removal of the fish cages. Based on our finds, it is concluded that the geochemical analysis of recent benthic foraminifera shells can serve as a powerful monitoring tool of bioavailable contaminants in seawater. Additionally, the results highlight the need for heavy metal monitoring near marine aquaculture facilities and suggest that long-term effects extend spatially and temporally far beyond the original point source. Finally, we observed variations in micro-distribution of elements within the top 1–2 μm of the shells, where Cu/Ca, Zn/Ca and P/Ca are consistently higher in the chamber wall than in the septa. This observation is relevant for studies conducting single chamber analyses.

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Benthic foraminifera geochemistry as a monitoring tool for heavy metal and phosphorus pollution — A post fish-farm removal case study

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

UN SDGs

Access to Document

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