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Alkaline Comet Assay as a Potential Tool in the Assessment of DNA Integrity in Freshwater Zooplankton Affected by Pollutants from Water Treatment Facility

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Abstract

In this pilot study, we evaluated the usefulness of the alkaline comet assay as a biomonitoring tool at the level of plankton communities affected by varying water quality. Zooplankton was collected in autumn 2007 and spring 2008 in two shallow lakes, one being predominantly polluted with aluminium compounds as result of water treatment process (Lake Njivice; 45°10′ N, 14°30′ E) and the other unpolluted (Lake Ponikve; 45°05′ N, 14°30′ E) used as control. Water and sediment chemistry parameters were assessed at both lake sampling sites. The results indicated that the main pollutant in both matrices was aluminium, whose concentrations exceeded the value of 0.15 mg/L−1 legally accepted for drinking water by Croatian water quality regulations. Plankton composition of the investigated lakes showed that only a few species are dominant and appear at both sites. Cladocerans are represented by Daphnia magna Straus 1820, and copepods by the calanoid Eudiaptomus padanus etruscus (Losito 1901), the cyclopoid Cyclops sp. and dipterans by larvae of Chaoborus flavicans (Meigen 1830). Other species were determined only occasionally and with low abundance. As observed, the comet assay had adequate sensitivity to detect the differences in levels of DNA damage among the dominant zooplankton taxa. Zooplanktons collected in Lake Njivice show a lower degree of DNA integrity compared with animals from the reference lake (Lake Ponikve). Inter-species variability in DNA damage was observed, indicating different genome susceptibility to the same genotoxic pollutants present in the aquatic environment. Furthermore, in the polluted Lake Njivice, seasonal differences in the levels of DNA damage within particular species of zooplankton were also noted. Calanoida, Daphnia and Chaoborus mainly had higher values of all three comet parameters in autumn 2007 than in spring 2008. Feeding modes strongly influenced the level of DNA damage in zooplankton species studied. We assume that the mechanisms of DNA damage and genotoxicity, as detected in the present comet assay study, were similar as those described in previous studies dealing with pollution by toxic metals. Although it was a preliminary study, obtained results confirmed the high sensitivity of the comet assay for the detection of DNA damage in cells of zooplankton organisms. The alkaline comet assay on simple aquatic organisms, as confirmed here, might represent an additional parameter useful in environmental risk assessment, especially in cases when other bioindicator species are very scarce or absent.

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Acknowledgement

This investigation was supported by the Croatian Ministry of Science, Education and Sports (grant nos. 022-0222148-2137 and 119-1193080-3076).

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  1. Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 6, 10 000, Zagreb, Croatia

    Ivančica Ternjej & Zlatko Mihaljević

  2. Hrvatske vode, Department of Water Protection, Central Water Management Laboratory, Ulica grada Vukovara 220, 10000, Zagreb, Croatia

    Igor Stanković

  3. Department of General and Inorganic Chemistry, Faculty of Chemical Engineering and Technology, University of Zagreb, Marulićev trg 19, 10 000, Zagreb, Croatia

    Lidija Furač

  4. Institute for Medical Research and Occupational Health, Mutagenesis Unit, Ksaverska c. 2, 10 000, Zagreb, Croatia

    Davor Želježić & Nevenka Kopjar

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  1. Ivančica Ternjej
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Ternjej, I., Stanković, I., Mihaljević, Z. et al. Alkaline Comet Assay as a Potential Tool in the Assessment of DNA Integrity in Freshwater Zooplankton Affected by Pollutants from Water Treatment Facility. Water Air Soil Pollut 204, 299–314 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-009-0046-4

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