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(425) Improving the understanding of the fate and effects of chemicals for risk assessment purposes. Comber, Mike1, Toy, Robin2, Marshall, Stuart3, Webb, Simon4, Holt, Martin5, 1 2 3 4 5 ABSTRACT- The chemical industry Long-range Research Initiative (LRI) has now been in progress for over 18 months. During this time four projects in the areas of persistence, bioaccumulation and ecotoxicity designed to help the understanding of the fate and effects of chemicals in the environment and thus to improve the risk assessment process for chemicals have been initiated. This talk will focus on the goals of the LRI, the projects that have been initiated (described below) and the future programme that is now being further developed. Persistence : a programme of work aimed at understanding the factors affecting environmental degradation and to what extent data from laboratory tests can be extrapolated to the field, with particular emphasis on the marine and terrestrial compartments. Comparison of marine and freshwater ecotoxicity data : a programme reviewing all the available ecotoxicity data to understand the relative sensitivities of marine and freshwater organisms. Soil and sediment toxicity : this project will examine the equilibrium partitioning approach to predicting toxicity of chemicals in the soil and sediment compartments. Relationship between bioaccumulation and critical body burden in biota in marine and terrestrial environments : this project will develop methods to investigate the biomagnification and bioaccumulation of chemicals and also to address the critical body burdens for chronic ecotoxicological endpoints of the same chemicals. Key words: Persistence, Bioaccumulation, Critical body burden |
