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Studies on Accumulation of Heavy Metals in Aquatic Organisms-I

1967; Springer Science+Business Media; Volume: 33; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2331/suisan.33.405

1349-998X

Kunio Ikuta,

Phosphorus and nutrient management

It is well known that aquatic organisms absorb and accumulate heavy metals in water environment, but we have no information on the mechanism of the absorption and accumulation of heavy metals and of their environmental factors affecting the absorption. When the concentration of the heavy metals in the water is under a certain limit, we can not observe any abnormal accumulation phenomenon, but when above a certain limit, we find abnormal accumulation. The study on green oysters is an instance showing the relations between the abnormal accumulation of heavy metals and industrial wastewaters containing heavy metals. The influence of the industrial wastewaters upon aquatic organisms has been discussed from the statistical, physiological, saprobiensystematic point of view, and the degree of the influence of the wastewater containing heavy metals has been done from the same point. The author is going to make clear the mechanism of absorption and accumulation of heavy metals in aquatic organisms and their environmental factors, furthermore a criteria of the influence of the wastewater containing heavy metals by determining their contents. This paper deals with the copper-contents in the meat of oysters which were collected in Nobeoka Bay and it's neighboring water, Miyazaki Prefecture, from January to March, 1965. This experiment was carried out in order to prove the difference between the coppercontents in oyster caught in the southern coast of Nobeoka Bay (S-group) and those in the waters adjacent to Nobeoka Bay (N-group). The results are summarized as follows: 1) According to the mean value of the copper-contents in oysters caught at each sampling location, S-group is ranged from 320.2 to 686.8mg Cu/kg fresh body weight, and N-group is ranged from 40.0 to 99.4mg. Between the copper-contents of S-group and N-group the evident difference is seen at the significance of 0.1%. 2) It appears that one of the environmental factors making copper concentrated in the oysters of S-group is due to the copper being discharged into sea water by a Benberg factory and the exhausted mine gutter. 3) The copper-contents in oysters at Kojima are nearly equal to those of OKADA & MOTOHASHI'S results, but the concentration of copper in the sea water at the southern Nobeoka Bay differs extremely from their study.