Persistent organic pollutants in biota samples collected during the Ymer-80 expedition to the Arctic

Abstract

During the 1980 expedition to the Arctic with the icebreaker Ymer, a number of vertebrate species were sampled for determination of persistent organic pollutants. Samples of Arctic char (Salvelinus alpinus, n034), glaucous gull (Larus hyperboreus, n08), common eider (Somateria mollissima, n010), Brü nnich's guillemot (Uria lomvia, n09), ringed seal (Pusa hispida, n02) and polar bear (Ursus maritimus, n02) were collected. With the exception of Brü nnich's guillemot, there was a marked contamination difference of birds from western as compared to eastern/northern Svalbard. Samples in the west contained a larger number of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) congeners and also polychlorinated terphenyls, indicating local sources. Brü nnich's guillemots had similar pollutant concentrations in the west and east/north; possibly younger birds were sampled in the west. In Arctic char, pollutant profiles from lake Linné vatn (n05), the lake closest to the main economic activities in Svalbard, were similar to profiles in Arctic char from the Shetland Islands (n05), but differed from lakes to the north and east in Svalbard (n030). Arctic char samples had higher concentrations of hexachlorocyclohexanes (HCHs) than the marine species of birds and mammals, possibly due to accumulation via snowmelt. Compared to the Baltic Sea, comparable species collected in Svalbard had lower concentrations of PCB and dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT), but similar concentrations indicating long-range transport of hexachlorobenzene, HCHs and cyclodiene pesticides. In samples collected in Svalbard in 1971, the concentrations of PCB and DDT in Brü nnich's guillemot (n07), glaucous gull (n02) and polar bear (n02) were similar to the concentrations found in 1980.To access the supplementary material for this article, please see supplementary files under Article Tools online.Contamination of the Arctic with persistent organic pollutants (POPs) gained interest in the 1980s when it was realized that northern indigenous peoples may carry high body burdens of these anthropogenic contaminants (Dewailly et al. 1989;de March et al. 1998). This triggered research to measure various POPs in biotic and abiotic samples from the Arctic with the aim to understand and model their global transport and fate (Wania & Mackay 1996). As a consequence, the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme, an international working In 1980, prior to the increased interest in organic contaminants in the Arctic, the Swedish icebreaker HMS Ymer performed an expedition to the eastern Arctic Ocean, the Ymer-80 expedition (Schytt 1983;Hoppe et al. 1987). The broad research programme included sampling of wildlife for the Swedish Museum of Natural History (SMNH). SMNH was, and is, a hub for the Swedish national environmental monitoring programme (SNEMP) for POPs in biota. The SNEMP for POPs was initiated at the end of the 1960s and includes, for example, sampling of fish in the sub-Arctic lakes of northern Sweden and fish and guillemot eggs from the central Baltic Sea. Consequen...

Assessment of Pesticide, Dioxin-like Polychlorinated Biphenyl, and Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon Existence around Galindez Island, and Comparison with the Organic Pollution Bibliography of the Antarctic Peninsula

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“…The Antarctic continent, in particular, is further away from anthropogenic influences. However, in the last few decades, organic pollutants have started to show up in these environments [1][2][3][4][5][6][7]. Therefore, the level of existing pollutants in the continent, whether new ones are transported, and, if they are, the transportation pathways, are issues that need to be investigated.…”

“…After long-range transport or local accumulations, the pollutants can directly settle on the sea or be deposited through permanent conservation in the moss, soil, snow, ice, or firm-ice cover. Accumulated contaminants may be released from melting ice and snow that sink into oceanic waters and sediments [8] and then may join the marine food web [5,6].…”

Five decades of terrestrial and freshwater research at Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard

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