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Laboratory Estimation of Net Trophic Transfer Efficiencies of PCB Congeners to Lake Trout Salvelinus namaycush from Its Prey
Published on: August 29, 2014
Changes to polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) signatures and enantiomer fractions across different tissue types in
David Megson1, Thomas A Brown2, Gwen O'Sullivan3
1School of Science and the Environment, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester M1 5GD, UK; Biogeochemistry Research Centre, SoGEES, Plymouth University, Plymouth, Devon PL4 8AA, UK.
Abstract:
Two Guillemot carcases were dissected, each providing 12 discrete tissue samples and 3 samples of partially digested food. One hundred and five PCBs from the 209 PCBs determined by GCxGC-ToFMS were detected. The relative proportions of individual PCBs did not vary greatly within tissue types, although the PCB profile from undigested food could be distinguished. Enantiomer fractions (EFs) were determined for CB-95, CB-136 and CB-149 by GC-HRqToFMS. EFs in the partially digested food were near racemic, with high levels of enrichment for E1 CB-95 in the kidneys and liver (EF of 0.80 and 0.84 respectively). This provides some of the clearest evidence to date that fractionation takes place in the organs where metabolic biotransformation and elimination of PCBs occurs. Our findings also confirm the ability of non-lethal sampling techniques, such as collection of small (<1 g) blood samples, to provide PCB signatures that are representative of an individual organism.
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