Reports on the state of the environment in Kosovo have emphasized that river and ground water quality is affected by pollution from untreated urban water as well as the waste water from the industry. One of the main contributors to this pollution is located in Obiliq (coal power plants). Prishtina-the capital city of Kosovo-is heavily influenced too. Furthermore, the pollutants combined together with those from heavy traffic are dissolved in Prishtina runoff water, which is discharged into the creek entering the river Sitnica together with urban waste water. The available data show the complex pollution with excessive quantities of nitrites, suspended materials, organic compounds, detergents, heavy metals, polychlorinated biphenyls, etc. In this study, the cytotoxic and genotoxic potential of water samples taken at these sites was tested in primary rat hepatocytes. The results obtained indicate that water samples collected in Prishtina and Obiliq had a significant cytotoxic potential in primary rat hepatocyte cultures even when diluted to 1 %. The increased cytotoxicity, however, was not accompanied by an increased genotoxicity as measured by the percentage of micronucleated cells. Further investigations addressing the chemical composition of the samples and the identification of the toxicants responsible for the cytotoxic effects found will be carried out in a next step.

It has been shown repeatedly that numerous cumulative changes occur in chromosomes of D. melanogaster, as an effect of ageing which, especially in the homozygous state, significantly affect different fitness components of their carriers. It appears that the observed age-affected events are produced by systematic and ontogenetically programmed changes in genetic loads at specific chromosomes, which are transferable to following generations. It has been suggested that such changes could be of mutational origin, and that they could be more frequent at gene loci which are epigenetically active during ontogenesis. It was demonstrated that a large sample of identical chromosomes behave quite differently in the homozygous state when obtained from aged compared to non-aged parents, producing a significant decrease in relative viability, length of preadult development, and longevity of their carriers, as well as in the frequency of recombinations of corresponding chromosomes. A specific treatment by streptomycin resulted in remarkably milder effects of ageing, which is in accordance with the statement of some authors that such a treatment may diminish the frequency of spontaneous recessive mutations in their carriers. Thus the observed age-affected changes could be an important source of developmental and evolutionary variation of living organisms.

It has been reported by the Ministry of Environment in Kosova that particle emissions from one of the units of the coal-fired power plants (Kosova A) in Kastriot/Obiliq were exceeding the European standard by some 74 times. Besides the particle emission, there is also release of sulphur dioxide, mono-nitrogen oxide (NOx), carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, organic compounds and heavy metals. In addition, there is also release of heavy metals and organic compounds from a nearby solid waste dumpsite. Together, they are considered to be responsible for the increased health problems of the population living in the vicinity.To study the genetic effects of these emissions we focused on the genetic load, that is, recessive mutations that affect the fitness of their carriers, of exposed wild living Drosophila melanogaster The effects of ash from the dumpsite on the other hand were investigated upon feeding the ash with the nutrient medium. Our results revealed that the D. melanogaster population from the Kastriot/Obiliq area carries a high genetic load of 54.7%. Drosophila fed with the nutrient medium containing ash in a concentration of 1% carried a genetic load of 37.1%, whilst increasing concentrations (2% and 3% of ash) led to higher genetic loads of 68.7% and 67.4%, respectively.

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We have recently shown that inhabitants of two polluted areas in Kosovo display more DNA damage (strand breaks in blood cell DNA) than do residents of a cleaner area. Here, we present additional analyses of these data and discuss additional data sets from Kosovo. Based on our data as well as the available data from other authors, age and sex-related differences in DNA damage or in susceptibility to DNA-damaging agents in the environment should be carefully considered when designing biomonitoring studies and when carrying out statistical analysis of the data.