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ECOTOXicology Knowledgebase System User Guide Version 5.4
Citation:
Olker, J., C. Elonen, AND D. Hoff. ECOTOXicology Knowledgebase System User Guide Version 5.4. U.S. EPA Office of Research and Development, Washington, DC, EPA/600/R-21/082, 2021.
Impact/Purpose:
The ECOTOXicology Knowledgebase (ECOTOX) is a curated database of toxic effects in ecologically-relevant species. Data from ECOTOX can be used in deriving not only local and federal Agency benchmarks such as the Superfund ecological soil screening levels, and OW ambient water quality criteria, but also for industrial chemical reviews, emergency responses, RCRA facility permits, and TMDLs. ECOTOX is now the most comprehensive ecotoxicology database and is essential for providing and supporting high quality models needed to estimate population effects of toxic chemicals across a wide range of species and spatially-explicit landscapes. ECOTOX provides a single repository for ecologically-based data, thereby improving consistency in effect characterizations and removing the need for duplicative efforts by States and EPA Program and Regional Offices. The initial ECOTOX Knowledgebase v.5.1 User guide was published (EPA/600/R-18/377) with accompanying Quick Reference guide (EPA/600/F-18/375). Documentation for ECOTOX is updated annually to ensure accurate and current information for utilizing and searching for information in the ECOTOX Knowledgebase, including changes and additions to data sources, effects data, and the web-based application. This document is the ECOTOXicology Knowledgebase System User Guide Version 5.4, updated March 2021.
Description:
The ECOTOX Knowledgebase is a comprehensive, publicly available application providing chemical environmental toxicity data on aquatic life, terrestrial plants and wildlife. ECOTOX data has been compiled over more than 30 years and currently includes over 51,000 references covering over 12,000 chemicals and over 13,000 species. Data from ECOTOX are used for all ecological risk assessments supporting pesticide registrations and re-registrations, all ambient water quality criteria for chemicals published since 1985, site-specific water quality criteria (by EPA Regions, States, and Tribes), and assessments used in emergency response. ECOTOX has established standard operating procedures that meet requirements for Agency systematic and transparent processes to identify and extract available information for use in Agency decision making. The meet the data needs for current toxicological assessments, new tools have been integrated into ECOTOX to improve data mining capabilities for end users such that environmental regulatory, the regulated industry, and researchers can more effectively and efficiently search and use existing toxic effects data. This User Guide provides documentation on utilizing and searching for information in the ECOTOX Knowledgebase to help users easily retrieve information from the electronic database through the web-based user interface. Included are details on how to conduct data searches and utilize the new data exploration tools, as well as appendices with example searches, list of ECOTOX fields with definitions, and information of sources of data included in ECOTOX.
URLs/Downloads:
ECOTOX USER GUIDE.PDF (PDF, NA pp, 862.039 KB, about PDF)https://nepis.epa.gov/Exe/ZyPURL.cgi?Dockey=P1011UJ1.txt