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- Bertram, Michael G., et al.
(author)
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Frontiers in quantifying wildlife behavioural responses to chemical pollution
- 2022
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In: Biological Reviews. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 1464-7931 .- 1469-185X. ; 97:4
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Animal behaviour is remarkably sensitive to disruption by chemical pollution, with widespread implications for ecological and evolutionary processes in contaminated wildlife populations. However, conventional approaches applied to study the impacts of chemical pollutants on wildlife behaviour seldom address the complexity of natural environments in which contamination occurs. The aim of this review is to guide the rapidly developing field of behavioural ecotoxicology towards increased environmental realism, ecological complexity, and mechanistic understanding. We identify research areas in ecology that to date have been largely overlooked within behavioural ecotoxicology but which promise to yield valuable insights, including within- and among-individual variation, social networks and collective behaviour, and multi-stressor interactions. Further, we feature methodological and technological innovations that enable the collection of data on pollutant-induced behavioural changes at an unprecedented resolution and scale in the laboratory and the field. In an era of rapid environmental change, there is an urgent need to advance our understanding of the real-world impacts of chemical pollution on wildlife behaviour. This review therefore provides a roadmap of the major outstanding questions in behavioural ecotoxicology and highlights the need for increased cross-talk with other disciplines in order to find the answers.
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| 2. |
- Fork, Megan L., et al.
(author)
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Dosing the Coast: Leaking Sewage Infrastructure Delivers Large Annual Doses and Dynamic Mixtures of Pharmaceuticals to Urban Rivers
- 2021
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In: Environmental Science and Technology. - : American Chemical Society (ACS). - 0013-936X .- 1520-5851. ; 55:17, s. 11637-11645
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Pharmaceuticals are commonly detected at low concentrations in surface waters, where they disrupt biological and ecological processes. Despite their ubiquity, the annual mass of pharmaceuticals exported from watersheds is rarely quantified. We used liquid chromatography-mass spectroscopy to screen for 92 pharmaceuticals in weekly samples from an urban stream network in Baltimore, MD, USA, that lacks wastewater treatment effluents. Across the network, we detected 37 unique compounds, with higher concentrations and more compounds in streams with higher population densities. We also used concentrations and stream discharge to calculate annual pharmaceutical loads at the watershed outlet, which range from less than 1 kg to μ15 kg and are equivalent to tens of thousands of human doses. By calculating annual watershed mass balances for eight compounds, we show that μ0.05 to μ42% of the pharmaceuticals consumed by humans in this watershed are released to surface waters, with the importance of different pathways (leaking sewage vs treated wastewater effluent) differing among compounds. These results demonstrate the importance of developing, maintaining, and improving sewage infrastructure to protect water resources from pharmaceutical contamination.
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| 3. |
- Rosi, Emma J., et al.
(author)
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Are animal disease reservoirs at risk of human antiviral exposure?
- 2023
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In: Environmental Science and Technology Letters. - : American Chemical Society (ACS). - 2328-8930. ; 10:5, s. 439-445
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Novel viral pathogens are causing diseases to emerge in humans, a challenge to which society has responded with technological innovations such as antiviral therapies. Antivirals can be rapidly deployed to mitigate severe disease, and with vaccines, they can save human lives and provide a long-term safety net against new viral diseases. Yet with these advances come unforeseen consequences when antivirals are inevitably released to the environment. Using SARS-CoV-2 as a case study, we identify global patterns of overlap between bats and elevated pharmaceutical concentrations in surface waters. We model how freshwater contamination by antivirals could result in exposure to insectivorous bats via consumption of emergent insects with aquatic larvae, ultimately risking the evolution of antiviral-resistant viruses in bats. The consequences of widespread antiviral usage for both human and ecosystem health underscore urgent frontiers in scientific research, antiviral development, and use.
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