M5 PM Marine Environmental Chemistry of Organic Pollutants
Monday, 14 November 2005: 1:50 PM - 5:30 PM in 321-323

(DIC-1117-814874) Transport and Fate of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) in Antarctic Coastal Seas.

Dickhut, R¹, Cincinelli, A², Cochran, M¹, Geisz, H¹, Ducklow, H¹, ¹ Virginia Institute of Marine Science, Gloucester Point, VA, USA² University of Florence, Florence, Italy

ABSTRACT- The introduction of POPs into the Antarctic marine ecosystem is thought to be due to long-range atmospheric transport and deposition in the absence of point source pollution on the Antarctic continent. We collected high volume air samples, seawater, sea ice, snow and glacier ice along the Antarctic Peninsula during both the austral winter (Sept.-Oct., 2001) and summer (Jan.-March, 2002). An abundance of hexachlorobenzene (HCB) was observed in Antarctic air along with hexachlorocyclohexanes (HCHs), heptachlor, and heptachlor epoxide. BDE-47 was also detected in Antarctic air. For some POPs there was little spatial or temporal variability in atmospheric levels in the Antarctic over the past decade, and high levels of heptachlor in the Antarctic air samples were coincident with air masses traveling into the region from lower latitudes. HCHs, heptachlor, heptachlor epoxide, and brominated diphenyl ethers (BDEs) were also detected in snow, sea ice, and glacier ice samples, indicating current atmospheric deposition of these POPs to the Antarctic. However, whereas BDEs appear to concentrate in glacier and sea ice, HCHs and heptachlor do not, indicating differential cycling of these contaminants in Antarctic coastal ecosystems. In this paper we will explore the relative importance of glacier ice and sea ice as storage reservoirs for POPs, the cycling of POPs between air, snow, and ice in the Antarctic, and the transfer of POPs to Antarctic marine biota.

Key words: POPs, Antarctic, transport, fate