Abstract
The increasing production of nano-TiO2 has attracted extensive concerns about the ecological consequence and health risk of these compounds in natural ecosystem. However, little is known about its toxicity on zooplankton, especially its possibility to access to the food chain via dietary exposure. To address this concern, the toxic and cumulative effects of nano-TiO2 on an aquatic food chain were explored through two trophic levels independently or jointly including producer and consumer. The results revealed that exposure to suspensions of nanomaterials had negative effects on both producers and consumers. Specifically, nanoparticles reduced the density of algal cells in a concentration-dependent way, and hatching life expectancy, average lifespan, net reproductive rate, and population intrinsic growth rate of rotifers decreased significantly with the concentration of nanomaterials increased (P < 0.05). Notably, nanoparticles accumulated in algal cells and were transferred to consumers through dietary exposure. Biomagnification of nano-TiO2 was observed in this simplified food chain, as many of the biomagnification factor (BMF) values in this study were >1. Exposure concentration, exposure time and their interactions play a strong part in the accumulation of nanoparticles in algae and rotifers. Overall, the present findings confirmed that nano-TiO2 was deleterious to plankton, posing a significant environmental threat to aquatic ecosystems.
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Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the anonymous referees for their valuable comments, constructive suggestions and editorial assistance, which have greatly improved the paper.
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This research was funded by National Natural Science Foundation of China (31872208), the State Key Laboratory of Pollution Control and Resource Reuse under Grant (PCRRF20040) and the University Synergy Innovation Program of Anhui Province under Grant (GXXT-2020-075).
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ML wrote the paper and performed the experiments and analyses. YZ and SF participated in the daily experiments. XZ, YX and XX putted forward suggestions on the design of the experiment and the writing of the paper. All authors contributed to the paper and gave final approval for publication.
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Li, M., Zhang, Y., Feng, S. et al. Bioaccumulation and biomagnification effects of nano-TiO2 in the aquatic food chain. Ecotoxicology 31, 1023–1034 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-022-02572-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-022-02572-0