Decoding historical and emerging environmental concerns of C chlorinated paraffins: Insights from marine sediment cores in the Pearl River Estuary.

Chlorinated paraffins (CPs) readily deposit in sediments upon entering estuaries and adjacent seas. Time-series investigations are indispensable for the long-term monitoring of historical releases and identifying CPs of emerging concerns in the marine environment. In this study, short-, medium-, and long-chain CPs (SCCPs, MCCPs, and LCCPs) were investigated using time-of-flight high-resolution mass spectrometry (ToF-HRMS) in sediment cores, dated between the 1920s and the 2010s sampled from Hong Kong waters and Lingdingyang of the Pearl River Estuary (PRE), South China.

Effectiveness of hierarchical Bayesian models for citizen science data with missing values: A case study on the factors influencing beach litter in Shimane Prefecture, Japan.

Citizen science can play an important role in addressing the issue of marine debris. However, citizen science data are often composed of inconsistent methods compared to data collected by experts. In this study, we applied beach cleanup data, collected in different survey years at different survey sites, to a hierarchical Bayesian model to elucidate the factors affecting the distribution of beach litter.

Environmental impact of removal of a large-scale sluice gate on Nakaumi Lagoon and adjacent coastal waters, southwest Japan: Evidence from long-term foraminiferal monitoring.

A large-scale sluice gate, which was built in southwest Japan as a national project to reclaim and desalinate lagoon water in 1974, was removed between 2005 and 2009. To examine the impact of this removal on both Nakaumi Lagoon and the nearby coastal waters, we analyzed the foraminiferal assemblages of a coastal sediment core and of samples obtained during 10 years of lagoon monitoring (2001-2010). Detailed Pb dating of the sediment core revealed an increased sediment accumulation rate in the coastal waters, implying that discharge of fine-grained materials, including organic matter, was facilitated by removal of the sluice gate.

Relative abundances of benthic foraminifera in response to total organic carbon in sediments: Data from European intertidal areas and transitional waters.

We gathered total organic carbon (%) and relative abundances of benthic foraminifera in intertidal areas and transitional waters from the English Channel/European Atlantic Coast (587 samples) and the Mediterranean Sea (301 samples) regions from published and unpublished datasets. This database allowed to calculate total organic carbon optimum and tolerance range of benthic foraminifera in order to assign them to ecological groups of sensitivity. Optima and tolerance range were obtained by mean of the weighted-averaging method.

Indicative value of benthic foraminifera for biomonitoring: Assignment to ecological groups of sensitivity to total organic carbon of species from European intertidal areas and transitional waters.

This work contributes to the ongoing work aiming at confirming benthic foraminifera as a biological quality element. In this study, benthic foraminifera from intertidal and transitional waters from the English Channel/European Atlantic coast and the Mediterranean Sea were assigned to five ecological groups using the weighted-averaging optimum with respect to TOC of each species. It was however not possible to assign typical salt marsh species due to the presence of labile and refractory organic matter that hampers TOC characterization.

Resonantly Enhanced Emission from a Luminescent Nanostructured Waveguide.

Controlling the characteristics of photon emission represents a significant challenge for both fundamental science and device technologies. Research on microcavities, photonic crystals, and plasmonic nanocavities has focused on controlling spontaneous emission by way of designing a resonant structure around the emitter to modify the local density of photonic states. In this work, we demonstrate resonantly enhanced emission using luminescent nanostructured waveguide resonance (LUNAR).

Selective fluorescence detection of 8-oxoguanosine with 8-oxoG-clamp.

8-oxoguanosine, which is derived from the oxidation of guanosine (dG), is known to induce transversion mutations (G:C-->T:A) in DNA. The compounds with a small molecular weight for recognizing 8-oxoG were designed on the basis of the structure of the G-clamp, which is reported to have selective affinity toward guanosine. The G-clamp derivatives with the additional binding units toward 8-oxoG were effectively synthesized and named "8-oxoG-clamps.

Development of a specific fluorescent probe for 8-oxoguanosine.

8-Oxoguanosine (8-oxoG) is derived from the oxidation of guanosine (dG) and is known to induce transversion mutations (G:C to T:A) in DNA. We have already reported the fluorescent probe "8-oxoG-clamp", which shows a selective fluorescence quenching phenomenon toward 8-oxoG. In this study, attachment of an additional fluorophore to 8-oxoG-clamp was investigated as a strategy for the detection of 8-oxoG by a fluorescence color change attributed to the 8-oxoG-clamp.

Fluorescence detection of 8-oxoguanosine by G-clamp derivatives.

8-Oxoguanosine, which is derived by the oxidation of guanosine (dG), is known to induce transversion mutations (G:C-->T:A) in DNA. The compounds with small molecular weight for recognizing 8-oxoG were designed on the basis of the structure of the G-clamp, which is reported to have selective affinity toward guanosine. The G-clamp derivatives with the additional binding units toward 8-oxoG were effectively synthesized and named "8-oxoG-clamps".