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Detection of Water and Sediments Pollution of An Arid Saltern (Sfax, Tunisia) by Coupling the Distribution of Microorganisms With Hydrocarbons

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Abstract

We investigated the coupling of abundance of bacteria, phytoplankton and ciliates with hydrocarbons in the surface water and sediments of five interconnected ponds in the arid Sfax solar salterns. This study aimed at determining the potential sources of hydrocarbons and the effects of salinity gradients on microorganism metabolism. Hydrocarbon analysis was performed by gas chromatography (GC-FID) and gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The GC-FID allowed the detection of aliphatic hydrocarbons and n-alkanes ranging from n-C13 to n-C30. Total aliphatic hydrocarbon concentrations varied from 92.5 mg. l−1 in the first pond (having marine characteristics) to 661.1 mg. l−1 in the last pond (crystallizer) (316.8 ± 120.1 mg. l−1) for water samples and from 26.7 to 127.8 μg. g−1 dry weight for sediment samples. The GC-MS enabled us to detect halogenated hydrocarbons (bromoalkanes and chloroalkanes) and n-alkenes. The distribution of n-alkanes indices coupled to several environmental factors suggests that a major fraction of hydrocarbons resulted from both prokaryotic (bacteria) and eukaryotic (protists) developments. A low hydrocarbon fraction might be petrogenic.

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Acknowledgements

We gratefully acknowledge support from the staff of the Sfax Saltern Company. This study was supported by the University of Franche-Comté (France) and the Tunisian Ministry of Scientific Research and Technology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculté des Sciences de Sfax, Département des Sciences de la Vie. Unité de recherche 00/UR/0907 Ecobiologie, Planctonologie & Microbiologie des Ecosystèmes Marins, Université de Sfax, Route soukra Km 3, 5 BP 802, CP 3018, Sfax, Tunisia

    Jannet Elloumi, Wassim Guermazi, Habib Ayadi & Abderrahmen Bouaïn

  2. Laboratoire de Biologie Environnementale, UsC INRA, UMR CNRS. 1, Université de Franche-comté, Place Leclerc, 25030, Besançon cedex, France

    Lotfi Aleya

Authors
  1. Jannet Elloumi
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  2. Wassim Guermazi
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  3. Habib Ayadi
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  4. Abderrahmen Bouaïn
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  5. Lotfi Aleya
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Correspondence to Lotfi Aleya.

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Elloumi, J., Guermazi, W., Ayadi, H. et al. Detection of Water and Sediments Pollution of An Arid Saltern (Sfax, Tunisia) by Coupling the Distribution of Microorganisms With Hydrocarbons. Water Air Soil Pollut 187, 157–171 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-007-9505-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-007-9505-y

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