Using indigenous microinvertebrates to assess the environmental impacts of soil pollution in Antarctica

• Main Author: McCarthy, Jordan Stanley
• Format: Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis
• Language: unknown
• Published: 2022
• Subjects: Antarctica; microinvertebrate; rotifer; tardigrade; soil; legacy pollution; metals; copper; nickel; Antarctic; McCarthy; The Antarctic; Antarc*; Rotifer; Tardigrade
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11343/326451

© 2022 Jordan Stanley McCarthy Modern humans have had a continuing presence in Antarctica since at least the 1800s, and this presence has come with an environmental footprint. Since the introduction of the Madrid protocol in the 1990s, the Antarctic Treaty has ensured the protection of the environment from current and future impacts of human activity and enshrines a responsibility to remediate legacy contamination. Ice-free areas of Antarctica only account for a small fraction (<0.5%) of the landmass of the continent but are the location of >94% of current permanent stations. The concentration of human activity in these areas disproportionately exposes them to the impact of our activities. Ecotoxicologically-derived sensitivity estimates for endemic species can be used to assess the impacts of soil contamination on terrestrial Antarctic environments, informing risk assessment and land management for environmental protection. Prior to the work completed herein, there was little ecotoxicological information available for indigenous terrestrial microinvertebrates from Antarctica and none for tardigrades and rotifers. This thesis investigated the use of endemic terrestrial rotifers and tardigrades from Antarctica to assess the impacts of metals (Cu and Ni) present in the environment from historic waste disposal sites on terrestrial Antarctic ecosystems. The thesis was split into two stages: an initial stage in which cultures of terrestrial Antarctic microinvertebrates were established and life history traits recorded, and a second, in which the sensitivity of these microinvertebrates to Cu and Ni was determined in soil-based media. Soil based media were used to model the physiochemical conditions experience by the terrestrially-sourced rotifers and tardigrades in the environment. The bdelloid rotifer 'Habrotrocha' sp. and tardigrade 'Acutuncus' sp. were successfully isolated from moss and soil samples and cultured in two soil-based growth mediums, a soil elutriate, and a balanced salt solution (BSS). Both ...