Effects of Chemical Compounds on the Activity of the N-acetyl-β-D-Glucosaminidase of the Marine Prawn, Palaemon serratus: Screening In Vitro.

N-acetyl-β-D-glucosaminidase (NAGase) is important for crustaceans because the enzyme activity is necessary for the molting process. The present study aimed to assess the sensitivity of Palaemon serratus NAGase activity to a set of compounds of diverse chemical families in the context of in vitro exposures. Compounds representing different chemical families were selected according to their abundance, impact in the environment, and relevance as disruptors of the molting process.

Lessons from linking bio- and ecological traits to stoichiometric traits in stream macroinvertebrates.

Ecologists rely on various functional traits when investigating the functioning of ecological systems and its responses to global changes. Changing nutrient levels, for example, can affect taxa expressing different trait combinations in various ways, e.g.

A 34-year survey under phosphorus decline and warming: Consequences on stoichiometry and functional trait composition of freshwater macroinvertebrate communities.

Worldwide, freshwater systems are subjected to increasing temperatures and nutrient changes. Under phosphorus and nitrogen enrichment consumer communities are often thought to shift towards fast-growing and P-rich taxa, supporting the well-known link between growth rate and body stoichiometry. While these traits are also favoured under warming, the temperature effect on stoichiometry is less clear.

Influence of microorganisms on uranium release from mining-impacted lake sediments under various oxygenation conditions.

Microbial processes can be involved in the remobilization of uranium (U) from reduced sediments under O reoxidation events such as water table fluctuations. Such reactions could be typically encountered after U-bearing sediment dredging operations. Solid U(IV) species may thus reoxidize into U(VI) that can be released in pore waters in the form of aqueous complexes with organic and inorganic ligands.

How does interspecific competition modify the response of grass plants against herbicide treatment? A hierarchical concentration-response approach.

Ecological interactions are rarely taken into account in environmental risk assessment. The objective of this work was to assess how interspecific competition affects the way plant species react to herbicides and more specifically how it modifies the concentration-response curves that can be built using ecotoxicological bioassays. To do this, we relied on the results of ecotoxicological bioassays on six herbaceous species exposed to isoproturon under two conditions: in presence and in absence of a competitor.

How diatom-, invertebrate- and fish-based diagnostic tools can support the ecological assessment of rivers in a multi-pressure context: Temporal trends over the past two decades in France.

The degradation of aquatic ecosystems, induced by worldwide intensification in the use of both land and aquatic resources, has highlighted the critical need for innovative methods allowing an objective quantification and ranking of anthropogenic pressure effects on aquatic organisms. Such diagnostic tools have a great potential for defining robust management responses to anthropogenic pressures. Our objective was to explore how the outputs of three diagnostic tools (based on benthic diatoms, macroinvertebrates and fishes) could be combined to (i) disentangle the temporal effects of multiple pressures over two decades and (ii) provide policy-relevant information for stream managers and decision makers.

Effect of interspecific competition on species sensitivity distribution models: Analysis of plant responses to chemical stress.

Species Sensitivity Distributions (SSD) are widely used in environmental risk assessment to predict the concentration of a contaminant that is hazardous for 5% of species (HC). They are based on monospecific bioassays conducted in the laboratory and thus do not directly take into account ecological interactions. This point, among others, is accounted for in environmental risk assessment through an assessment factor (AF) that is applied to compensate for the lack of environmental representativity.

A multi-omics concentration-response framework uncovers novel understanding of triclosan effects in the chlorophyte Scenedesmus vacuolatus.

In aquatic ecosystems, the biocide triclosan represents a hazard for the non-target microalgae. So far, algal responses were mainly investigated at apical levels hampering the acquisition of a holistic view on primary, adaptive, and compensatory stress responses. We assessed responses of the chlorophyte Scenedesmus vacuolatus to triclosan at apical (growth, photosynthesis) and molecular (transcriptome, metabolome) levels for comparative pathway sensitivity analysis.

Microplastics enhance Daphnia magna sensitivity to the pyrethroid insecticide deltamethrin: Effects on life history traits.

The aim of the study was to investigate the influence of microplastics (MPs) on the ecotoxicity of common contaminants of aquatic ecosystems. As a model contaminant, the hydrophobic pesticide deltamethrin (DM) was chosen, and its effects on life history traits of Daphnia magna were studied in the presence or absence of polyethylene MPs. Commercialized DM and MPs obtained as dry powder were used in the experiment.

High food quality increases infection of Gammarus pulex (Crustacea: Amphipoda) by the acanthocephalan parasite Pomphorhynchus laevis.

Parasitism is an important process in ecosystems, but has been largely neglected in ecosystem research. However, parasites are involved in most trophic links in food webs with, in turn, a major role in community structure and ecosystem processes. Several studies have shown that higher nutrient availability in ecosystems tends to increase the prevalence of parasites.

Agricultural and domestic pesticides in house dust from different agricultural areas in France.

Pesticides have been associated with various pathologies, and there is growing evidence of pesticide presence in domestic environments. However, most available studies focused on a limited number of pesticides or households, and few have been conducted in Europe. We aimed to assess indoor pesticide contamination by screening the prevalence of 276 pesticides and ten pesticide metabolites, in French households from different agricultural and urban areas.

Does intraspecific variability matter in ecological risk assessment? Investigation of genotypic variations in three macrophyte species exposed to copper.

To limit anthropogenic impact on ecosystems, regulations have been implemented along with global awareness that human activities are harmful to the environment. Ecological risk assessment (ERA) is the main procedure which allows to assess potential impacts of stressors on the environment as a result of human activities. ERA is typically implemented through different steps of laboratory testing.

DRomics: A Turnkey Tool to Support the Use of the Dose-Response Framework for Omics Data in Ecological Risk Assessment.

Omics approaches (e.g., transcriptomics, metabolomics) are promising for ecological risk assessment (ERA) since they provide mechanistic information and early warning signals.

High stoichiometric food quality increases moulting organism vulnerability to pollutant impacts: An experimental test with Gammarus fossarum (Crustacea: Amphipoda).

Headwater organisms are most often simultaneously faced with multiple stressors such as low resource quality and pollutants. Higher food quality has been hypothesized to enhance the tolerance of organisms to pollutants, but the interactive effects of food quality and pollutants on species and ecosystems remain poorly studied. To better understand these interactive effects, we experimentally manipulated the phosphorus (P) content of two leaf litters with contrasted carbon quality (alder and maple).

Assessing anthropogenic pressures on streams: A random forest approach based on benthic diatom communities.

Benthic diatoms have been widely used to assess the ecological status of freshwater ecosystems, especially in the context of recent international water framework directive policies (e.g. the WFD).

Sample size calculation in metabolic phenotyping studies.

The number of samples needed to identify significant effects is a key question in biomedical studies, with consequences on experimental designs, costs and potential discoveries. In metabolic phenotyping studies, sample size determination remains a complex step. This is due particularly to the multiple hypothesis-testing framework and the top-down hypothesis-free approach, with no a priori known metabolic target.

Efficiency of wipe sampling on hard surfaces for pesticides and PCB residues in dust.

Pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are commonly found in house dust and have been described as a valuable matrix to assess indoor pesticide and PCB contamination. The aim of this study was to assess the efficiency and precision of cellulose wipe for collecting 48 pesticides, eight PCBs, and one synergist at environmental concentrations. First, the efficiency and repeatability of wipe collection were determined for pesticide and PCB residues that were directly spiked onto three types of household floors (tile, laminate, and hardwood).

SRV: an open-source toolbox to accelerate the recovery of metabolic biomarkers and correlations from metabolic phenotyping datasets.

Motivation: Supervised multivariate statistical analyses are often required to analyze the high-density spectral information in metabolic datasets acquired from complex mixtures in metabolic phenotyping studies. Here we present an implementation of the SRV-Statistical Recoupling of Variables-algorithm as an open-source Matlab and GNU Octave toolbox. SRV allows the identification of similarity between consecutive variables resulting from the high-resolution bucketing.

Time-dependent species sensitivity distributions.

Time is a central component of toxicity assessments. However, current ecotoxicological practice marginalizes time in concentration-response (C-R) modeling and species sensitivity distribution (SSD) analyses. For C-R models, time is invariably fixed, and toxicity measures are estimated from a function fitted to the data at that time.

Survival data analyses in ecotoxicology: critical effect concentrations, methods and models. What should we use?

In ecotoxicology, critical effect concentrations are the most common indicators to quantitatively assess risks for species exposed to contaminants. Three types of critical effect concentrations are classically used: lowest/ no observed effect concentration (LOEC/NOEC), LC( x) (x% lethal concentration) and NEC (no effect concentration). In this article, for each of these three types of critical effect concentration, we compared methods or models used for their estimation and proposed one as the most appropriate.

Population-level modeling to account for multigenerational effects of uranium in Daphnia magna.

As part of the ecological risk assessment associated with radionuclides in freshwater ecosystems, toxicity of waterborne uranium was recently investigated in the microcrustacean Daphnia magna over a three-generation exposure (F0, F1, and F2). Toxic effects on daphnid life history and physiology, increasing over generations, were demonstrated at the organism level under controlled laboratory conditions. These effects were modeled using an approach based on the dynamic energy budget (DEB).

Temperature limits trail following behaviour through pheromone decay in ants.

In Mediterranean habitats, temperature affects both ant foraging behaviour and community structure. Many studies have shown that dominant species often forage at lower temperature than subordinates. Yet, the factors that constrain dominant species foraging activity in hot environments are still elusive.

A new perspective on the Dunnett procedure: filling the gap between NOEC/LOEC and ECx concepts.

The no-observed-effect concentration (NOEC) is known to be based on a wrong usage of hypothesis tests, and the use of confidence intervals is preferred. The purpose of the present study is to provide an easy and proper way to interpret ecotoxicological tests based on simultaneous confidence intervals associated with the commonly used Dunnett procedure, and to show how these intervals may allow one to infer ECx values (effective concentrations).