PH25 Wildlife Ecotoxicology II
Exhibit Hall
8:00 AM - Thursday
(PH280) The acute and chronic effects of Perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) to mallards.
Newsted, J1, Gallagher, S2, Beach, S.3, Giesy, J.4, 1 ENTRIX, Inc, Okemos, MI, USA2 Wildlife International, Ltd., Easton, MD, USA3 3M, St. Paul, MN, USA4 Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA
ABSTRACT- Perfluorinated chemicals have been widely used in commerce and until recently, little was known about their environmental fate and their potential environmental effects. The assessment of possible effects has been hampered by a lack of toxicological data in wildlife. Recently, several toxicological studies have examined the acute and chronic effects of PFOS on avian species. Here we review and evaluate the results of studies conducted with the mallard (Anas platyrhynchos). Toxicological endpoints that were evaluated included mortality, behavior and appearance, body weight, growth, feed consumption, gross pathology and histopathology. Reproductive endpoints included egg production, measures of egg fertility and hatchability, and offspring survival. PFOS concentrations were also measured in eggs and the liver and serum of adults and offspring. In a dietary acute study, the 8-day LC50 for mallards was 603 mg PFOS/kg (95% CI= 431-938) while the NOAEC based on the reduction of body weight gain was 35.1 mg PFOS/kg. In the reproduction study, mallards were exposed to 0, 10, 50 and 150 mg PFOS/kg in the diet. However, due to overt signs of toxicity by Week 5, only the 10 mg PFOS/kg treatment was continued for 21 weeks. In this dose group, no treatment related effects on adult body weight, feed consumption or liver weight were observed.. In adult males, there was an increase in the incidence of small testes size. No statistically significant alterations in any reproductive parameters were observed in birds from the 10 mg PFOS/kg treatment group. However, sex-specific differences in serum and liver PFOS concentrations in adult birds were observed and a kinetic analysis was conducted on the data. The results of kinetic analysis are discussed. Mallard results are compared of other avian and mammalian toxicity data.
Key words: PFOS, Mallard, Toxicity, fluorochemical