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Quantification of Toxic Effects for Water Concentration-based Aquatic Life Criteria -Part B
Citation:
ERICKSON, R. J. Quantification of Toxic Effects for Water Concentration-based Aquatic Life Criteria -Part B. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, EPA/600/R-09/146, 2011.
Impact/Purpose:
This report is the second in a series regarding mathematical models that can be used in EPA water quality criteria for the protection of aquatic ("aquatic life criteria") to better quantify risks to aquatic organisms from toxic chemicals as a function of exposure concentration and time.
Description:
Erickson et al. (1991) conducted a series of experiments on the toxicity of pentachloroethane (PCE) to juvenile fathead minnows. These experiments included evaluations of bioaccumulation kinetics, the time-course of mortality under both constant and time-variable exposures, the response of fish growth rate to constant and time-variable exposures, and the relationship of toxic effects to PCE accumulation. This section will examine mortality in these experiments and evaluate the applicability of the toxicity models discussed in Section 2 of Part A of this report, first considering the "implicit" models already applied to copper toxicity in Section 3, and then the "explicit" models using information gathered in these experiments regarding PCE accumulation kinetics and the relationship of effects to PCE accumulation. Both deterministic and stochastic toxicity models will be evaluated, but only in their simplest forms (Eq. 2.1-2.7, Eq. 2.22-2.28), because the data in these experiments are insufficient to consider more complicated models with multiple processes and/or compartments. Subsequent work will evaluate growth effects in these experiments.