| Summary: | Due to the consideration of bioremediation for oil spills, it is important to understand the ecological and human health implications of bioremediation efforts. uring biodegradation, the toxicity of the polluting material may actually increase upon the conversion of non-toxic constituents to toxic species. lso, toxic compounds refractory to biological degradation may compromise the effectiveness of the treatment technique. n such complex situations, it is impractical to use analytical chemistry methods to detect and quantify all potential toxins that cause chronic effects. onsequently, biological test systems complement chemical-specific analyses. n this study, the Salmonella mutagenicity assay showed that both the Prudhoe Bay crude oil and its weathered counterpart collected from oil-impacted water were weakly mutagenic. he mutagenicity of samples collected from the contaminated beaches declined over time as a result of both bioremediation and natural processes. esults also showed that the mutagenic components were depleted at a faster rate than the overall content of organic material.
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