Assessing the long-term effect of exposure to dispersant-treated oil on fish health using hypoxia tolerance and temperature susceptibility as ecologically relevant biomarkers

• Published in: Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry
• Main Authors: Mauduit, Florian, Farrell, Anthony P., Domenici, Paolo, Lacroix, Camille, Le Floch, Stéphane, Lemaire, Philippe, Nicolas-Kopec, Annabelle, Whittington, Mark, Le Bayon, Nicolas, Zambonino-Infante, Jose-Luis, Claireaux, Guy
• Other Authors: Laboratoire des Sciences de l'Environnement Marin (LEMAR) (LEMAR), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer (IFREMER)-Université de Brest (UBO)-Institut Universitaire Européen de la Mer (IUEM), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université de Brest (UBO)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université de Brest (UBO)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), University of British Columbia (UBC), CNR Institute for Coastal Marine Environment (IAMC), National Research Council of Italy, Centre de documentation de recherche et d'expérimentations sur les pollutions accidentelles des eaux (Cedre), Cedre, Total M&S Paris La Defense, TOTAL FINA ELF, Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer (IFREMER)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2019
• Subjects: ACL; ecotoxicology; Hypoxia; petroleum-hydrocarbons; Temperature; dicentrarchus-labrax; weathered crude-oil; european sea bass; causes physiological disruption; chronic dietary exposure; environmental toxicology; fish indices; oil spills; polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs); salmon oncorhynchus-gorbuscha; zebrafish danio-rerio; [SDV.TOX.ECO]Life Sciences [q-bio]/Toxicology/Ecotoxicology; [SDE.BE]Environmental Sciences/Biodiversity and Ecology; [SDU.STU.OC]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Oceanography; Oncorhynchus gorbuscha
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-02873893; https://hal.science/hal-02873893/document; https://hal.science/hal-02873893/file/Mauduit_etal_ETaC_2019.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1002/etc.4271

WOS:000454424900020 International audience The ecological and economic importance of fish act as a brake on the development of chemical dispersants as operational instruments following oil spills. Although a valuable and consistent body of knowledge exists, its use in spill response is limited. The objective of the present study was to increase current knowledge base to facilitate the translation of published data into information of operational value. Thus we investigated the dose-response relationship between dispersant-treated oil exposure and ecologically relevant consequences by combining laboratory and field experiments. Effects were examined over almost a year using juveniles of the slowly growing, commercially important European sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax). A reliable interpretation of biomarker responses requires a complete knowledge of the factors likely to affect them. Interpopulational variability is of particular importance in environmental impact assessment because biomarker responses from a population collected in an impacted area are classically compared with those collected in a clean site. Our study revealed no effect of the exposure to dispersant-treated oil on fish hypoxia tolerance and temperature susceptibility at 1 and 11 mo post exposure. Similarly, no effect of the exposure was observed on the ability of the fish to cope with environmental contingencies in the field, regardless of the dose tested. Thus we feel confident to suggest that a 48-h exposure to chemically treated oil does not affect the ability of sea bass to cope with mild environmental contingencies. Finally, investigation of interpopulation variability revealed large differences in both hypoxia tolerance and temperature susceptibility among the 2 populations tested, suggesting that this variability may blur the interpretation of population comparisons as classically practiced in impact assessment.