Decreased Growth Rate Associated with Tissue Contaminants in Juvenile Chinook Salmon Out-Migrating through an Industrial Waterway.

The industrial waterway in Portland Harbor, Oregon, is a migration corridor for a distinct population segment of Chinook Salmon (Upper Willamette River) currently protected by the U.S. Endangered Species Act.

Low-level embryonic crude oil exposure disrupts ventricular ballooning and subsequent trabeculation in Pacific herring.

There is a growing awareness that transient, sublethal embryonic exposure to crude oils cause subtle but important forms of delayed toxicity in fish. While the precise mechanisms for this loss of individual fitness are not well understood, they involve the disruption of early cardiogenesis and a subsequent pathological remodeling of the heart much later in juveniles. This developmental cardiotoxicity is attributable, in turn, to the inhibitory actions of crude oil-derived mixtures of polycyclic aromatic compounds (PACs) on specific ion channels and other proteins that collectively drive the rhythmic contractions of heart muscle cells via excitation-contraction coupling.

Embryonic Crude Oil Exposure Impairs Growth and Lipid Allocation in a Keystone Arctic Forage Fish.

As Arctic ice recedes, future oil spills pose increasing risk to keystone species and the ecosystems they support. We show that Polar cod (Boreogadus saida), an energy-rich forage fish for marine mammals, seabirds, and other fish, are highly sensitive to developmental impacts of crude oil. Transient oil exposures ≥300 μg/L during mid-organogenesis disrupted the normal patterning of the jaw as well as the formation and function of the heart, in a manner expected to be lethal to post-hatch larvae.

Pre-oil spill baseline profiling for contaminants in Southern Resident killer whale fecal samples indicates possible exposure to vessel exhaust.

The Southern Resident killer whale population (Orcinus orca) was listed as endangered in 2005 and shows little sign of recovery. Exposure to contaminants and risk of an oil spill are identified threats. Previous studies on contaminants have largely focused on legacy pollutants.

Bioaccumulation of polychlorinated biphenyls in juvenile chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) outmigrating through a contaminated urban estuary: dynamics and application.

A field study was conducted to examine bioaccumulation of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) for hatchery-raised and naturally reared (wild) ocean-type juvenile chinook salmon outmigrating through the Lower Duwamish Waterway (LDW), a contaminated urban estuary in Seattle, WA, USA. These results show differences in bioaccumulation of PCBs over time and space in this estuary, which may also occur for any contaminant that is distributed heterogeneously in this system. Highly mobile, outmigrating salmon accumulated approximately 3-5 times more PCBs on the east side of the LDW than fish on the west side, which is supported by an almost identical difference in mean sediment concentrations.

Organic and trace metal contaminants in sediments and English sole tissues from Vancouver Harbour, Canada.

As part of a multinational workshop on marine environmental quality, sediments were collected from seven sites in Vancouver Harbour and analyzed for polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and organochlorines (OCs), and for trace metals. English sole were collected from five sites, and muscle was analyzed for trace metals and liver for OCs. As expected, sediment PAH and OC concentrations and tissue OC concentrations were higher at sites east of the First Narrows, compared to the outer harbor and reference sites.