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Toxicokinetics/toxicodynamics with damage feedback improves risk assessment for tilapia and freshwater clam exposed to arsenic

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Abstract

It has been proposed that irreversible responses of organisms exposed to contaminants are due to a systems-level feedback. Here we tested this hypothesis by reanalyzing the published data on toxicokinetics and survival probability based on a systems-level threshold damage model (TDM) incorporating with a positive damage feedback to explore the steady-state response and dynamic behavior of damage for tilapia and freshwater clam exposed to waterborne arsenic (As). We found that ultrasensitivity appeared in As–tilapia and freshwater clam systems with Hill coefficient n ≥ 4, indicating that the positive damage feedback mechanism has been triggered. We confirmed that damage can trigger a positive feedback loop that together with As stressor increases irreversibility. This study also showed that TDM with positive feedback gave a much better predictability than that of TDM at As concentrations ranging from 100 to 500 mg l−1 for freshwater clam, whereas for tilapia, two models had nearly same performance on predictability. We suggested that mortality–time profile derived Hill coefficient could be used as a new risk indicator to assess the survival probability for species exposed to waterborne metals. We anticipated that the proposed toxicokinetics/toxicodynamics with a positive damage feedback may facilitate our understanding and manipulation of complex mechanisms of metal susceptibility among species and improve current risk assessment strategies.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Bioenvironmental Systems Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, 10617, Taiwan, ROC

    Wei-Yu Chen, Chung-Min Liao & Yun-Ru Ju

  2. Department of Life Science, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, 11677, Taiwan, ROC

    Sher Singh

  3. Department of Biomechatronic Engineering, National Ilan University, Ilan, 26047, Taiwan, ROC

    Li-John Jou

  4. Department of Post-Modern Agriculture, MingDao University, Changhua, 52345, Taiwan, ROC

    Bo-Ching Chen

  5. Graduate Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, China Medical University, Taichung, 40402, Taiwan, ROC

    Jeng-Wei Tsai

Authors
  1. Wei-Yu Chen
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  2. Chung-Min Liao
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  3. Yun-Ru Ju
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  4. Sher Singh
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  5. Li-John Jou
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  6. Bo-Ching Chen
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  7. Jeng-Wei Tsai
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Correspondence to Chung-Min Liao.

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Chen, WY., Liao, CM., Ju, YR. et al. Toxicokinetics/toxicodynamics with damage feedback improves risk assessment for tilapia and freshwater clam exposed to arsenic. Ecotoxicology 21, 485–495 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-011-0810-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-011-0810-2

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