Ecological risk of imidacloprid on the Brazilian non-target freshwater organisms Chironomus sancticaroli and Poecilia reticulata.

Imidacloprid (IMI) is a neonicotinoid insecticide widely used in agriculture worldwide. This pesticide has been found in freshwater ecosystems, including Brazilian freshwaters. For this reason, studies are being conducted to detect the presence of IMI in freshwater and understand its effects on the aquatic biota.

Connections among Land Use, Water Quality, Biodiversity of Aquatic Invertebrates, and Fish Behavior in Amazon Rivers.

Rivers in the Amazon have among the greatest biodiversity in the world. The Xingu River, one of the tributaries of the Amazon River, has a length of 1640 km, draining 510,000 km2 in one of the most protected regions on the planet. The Middle Xingu region in Brazil has been highly impacted by mining and livestock farming, leading to habitat fragmentation due to altered water quality.

Factors that control the spatial and temporal distributions of phosphorus, nitrogen, and carbon in the sediments of a tropical reservoir.

The impacts of anthropic activities have had profound effects on the nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) cycles in many aquatic ecosystems. We investigated the spatial and temporal distributions of carbon (C), N, and P in the sediments of a tropical Paiva Castro Reservoir (São Paulo, Brazil), as well as their release and retention in the system. In 2010, surface sediments were collected at nine sites in the reservoir, and a core was obtained in the limnetic zone, in 2010.

Metals in sediments: bioavailability and toxicity in a tropical reservoir used for public water supply.

Sediments may be a repository of contaminants in freshwater ecosystems. One way to assess the quality of this compartment, in terms of potentially bioavailable metals, is by the analysis of acid-volatile sulfide (AVS) and simultaneously extracted metals (SEM). In order to investigate the bioavailability, toxicity, and compartmentalization of different metals (Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni, Pb, Zn), sampling of surface sediments was performed at nine stations along the Paiva Castro reservoir (São Paulo, Brazil).