MONITOX international network for monitoring of environmental toxicants and risk assessment in the Black Sea basin: research and interdisciplinary cooperation dimensions

Abstract

The paper presents the main tackled issues and results concerning the monitoring of the toxic substances (TOXs) in the network established in the frame of BSB27 MONITOX project, implemented by «Dunarea de Jos» University of Galati, Romania (Leader Partner) in partnership with Institute of Zoology, Republic of Moldova, International Hellenic University (IHU), Greece, Institute of Geology and Seismology, Republic of Moldova (IGS), and “Danube Delta” National Institute for Research and Development, Tulcea, Romania. Maps of pollution of water, sediments, soils and biota with TOXs built using ArcGIS and Q-GIS highlight their levels and spatial-temporal distribution in the target zones in the three countries: Danube River (Lower sector), Prut and Dniester Rivers, Danube Delta, Black Sea coast, Nestos River and delta and Northern Aegean Sea coast. The strategy designed and results of the interdisciplinary studies performed in the period 2018-2021 on a large range of toxic pollutants in the Black Sea Basin (including NE part of Greece) are emphasized, as well as the assessment of toxicants’ impact upon human health using a health risk calculator developed as ICT tool.

Multi-Elemental Characterization of Soils in the Vicinity of Siderurgical Industry: Levels, Depth Migration and Toxic Risk

“…ICP-MS was applied for cadmium determination with the aid of an Agilent 7700X ICP-MS (Agilent, Santa Clara, CA, USA) spectrometer from the International Hellenic University (IHU), Kavala, Greece, a partner laboratory of the INPOLDE center within the framework of the MONITOX network [20], as described in a previous study [14]. The solid homogenized soil samples were weighed via the analytical balance (≈3 g), and 30 mL of strong HCl and HNO 3 mixture at a ratio of 1:3 (aqua regia) was added.…”

“…The work was carried out as a continuation and extension of pollution and risk assessment in previous studies limited to soil contamination with heavy metals [6,11,15] and persistent organic pollutants (POPs) [16] in the Galati industrial area and SE Romania in the period 2005-2009, and in connection with other international projects focused on the determination of toxic compounds and assessment of ecological and human health risk in the Black Sea Basin [3,14,19,20].…”

Poziomy zewnętrznych dawek promieniowania gamma w wybranych miejscach w Rumunii, Mołdawii i Grecji

“…Three-quarters of the radioactivity in the environment comes from natural elements [1][2][3]. Due to the destructive effects on humans and other living organisms, measurement of the ionizing radiation doses in the environmental compartments in various regions of the world is very important, besides the monitoring of various classes of toxicants [4].…”

“…The targeted sites are found in the Eastern Carpathians Mountains, Lower Danube basin, Danube Delta, Lower Prut River Reserve, Dniester River, as well as the Black Sea and Northern Aegean Sea basins (Figure 1). The information will be used to complete the data for mapping the environmental radioactivity [5,6] in SE Europe and to compare with real-time monitoring data provided by the European Commission [7].…”

Multi-elemental Characterization of Soils in the Vicinity of Siderurgical Industry: Levels, Depth Migration and Toxic Risk

“…The work was carried out as a continuation and extension of pollution and risk assessment of previous studies limited to soil contamination with heavy metals [4,10,11,16] and persistent organic pollutants (POPs) [17] in Galati industrial area and SE Romania in the period 2005-2009, and in connection with other projects implemented in the frame of international networks, focused on the determination of toxic compounds (heavy metals, radionuclides, POPs, pharmaceutics and endocrine disruptors) and assessment of ecological and human health risk in the Black Sea Basin [3,14,15,22,24].…”