Development of a soil exposure assessment for plant protection products in Brazil: Requirements, options, and recommendations.

The Brazilian Environmental Authority (IBAMA) has recently identified soil organisms as a priority area for risk assessment development for plant protection products. This includes consideration of which species in soil fauna are important to be tested for risk assessment purposes, which ecotoxicological tests should be used, and which exposure models would be suitable, considering Brazilian soils, local agricultural practices, and local biodiversity. In this brief communication, we present proposals and recommendations for the selection of appropriate regulatory exposure assessment techniques to support initial or foundation tier assessment.

Applying a tiered environmental risk assessment framework to estimate the risk of pesticides to soil organisms in Latin America.

This work investigates the application of a tiered risk assessment scheme for soil organisms based on the risk quotient (RQ) and the toxicity exposure ratio (TER). Forty-five pesticides registered in Latin America were chosen and the ecotoxicological endpoints for earthworms, Collembola, and microorganisms were collated. Tier I assessment was made on conservative assumptions in which no refinements were applied.

Pseudoreplication and the usage of biomarkers in ecotoxicological bioassays.

Pseudoreplication is a widely discussed topic in the scientific community. Its principal critique concerns the lack of independence in flawed experimental designs and the use of inferential statistics to test the hypothesis of such experiments. Thirty years after its appearance, it remains misunderstood by many researchers, including ecotoxicologists.

A multibiomarker evaluation of urban, industrial, and agricultural exposure of small characins in a large freshwater basin in southern Brazil.

Iguaçu River is the second most polluted river of Brazil. It receives agrochemicals and contaminants of urban and industrial sources along its course. A multibiomarker approach was employed here to evaluate the health of a small characin (Astyanax spp.