title: Estuarine ecological risk based on hepatic histopathological indices from laboratory and in situ tested fish.
abstract: Juvenile Senegalese soles were exposed through 28-day laboratory and field (in situ) bioassays to sediments from three sites of the Sado estuary (W Portugal): a reference and two contaminated by metallic and organic contaminants. Fish were surveyed for ten hepatic histopathological alterations divided by four distinct reaction patterns and integrated through the estimation of individual histopathological condition indices. Fish exposed to contaminated sediments sustained more damage, with especial respect to regressive changes like necrosis. However, differences were observed between laboratory- and field-exposed animals, with the latest, for instance, exhibiting more pronounced fatty degeneration and hepatocellular eosinophilic alteration. Also, some lesions in fish exposed to the reference sediment indicate that in both assays unaccounted variables produced experimental background noise, such as hyaline degeneration in laboratory-exposed fish. Still, the field assays yielded results that were found to better reflect the overall levels of contaminants and physico-chemical characteristics of the tested sediments.
authors.affiliation: IMAR-Instituto do Mar, Departamento de Ciências e Engenharia do Ambiente, Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2829-516 Caparica, Portugal. pmcosta@fct.unl.pt
authors.forename: Pedro M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Costa
authors.forename: Sandra
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Caeiro
authors.forename: Jorge
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lobo
authors.forename: Marta
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Martins
authors.forename: Ana M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Ferreira
authors.forename: Miguel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Caetano
authors.forename: Carlos
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Vale
authors.forename: T Ángel
authors.initials: TÁ
authors.lastname: DelValls
authors.forename: Maria H
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Costa
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000378:metabolism; D016000:Cluster Analysis; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000379:methods*; D005412:Flatfishes / Q000378:metabolism*; D005618:Fresh Water / Q000737:chemistry; D019015:Geologic Sediments / Q000737:chemistry; D008099:Liver / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology; D008670:Metals / Q000633:toxicity; D011174:Portugal; D018570:Risk Assessment; D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical / Q000633:toxicity*
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D008670:Metals; D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical