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Updated: Aug 15, 2026

A Toolkit to Enable Hydrocarbon Conversion in Aqueous Environments
Published on: October 2, 2012
Alteration and release of aliphatic compounds by the polychaete Nereis virens (Sars) experimentally fed with
F Gilbert1, G Stora, G Desrosiers
1Laboratoire d'Océanographie et de Biogéochimie, UMR CNRS 6535, Campus de Luminy, Case 901, F-13288 Cedex 09, Marseille, France
Abstract:
In the laboratory, marine worms were fed with a mixture of algae and several aliphatic hydrocarbons for 15 days. After ingestion by the worms, 34.9% of hydrocarbons are found in the faeces and only 3.1% accumulated in the gut. The comparison between the initial mixture and the faeces shows that the worm's digestive process lead to changes in the distribution of the n-alkane mixture. These changes are different from those only due to physical processes in the experimental conditions. In our experiment, no variation in the distribution of hydrocarbons in faeces with time and no microbial hydrocarbon biodegradation were evidenced. Our results suggest that marine worm feeding can substantially affect the fate of hydrocarbons in the sedimentary marine ecosystem by predominantly stimulating dissolution processes.
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