Network analysis to reveal the most commonly detected compounds in predator-prey pairs in freshwater and marine mammals and fish in Europe

Marine and freshwater mammalian predators and fish samples, retrieved from environmental specimen banks (ESBs), natural history museum (NHMs) and other scientific collections, were analysed by LIFE APEX partners for a wide range of legacy and emerging contaminants (2545 in total). Network analysis was used to visualize the chemical occurrence data and reveal the predominant chemical mixtures for the freshwater and marine environments. For this purpose, a web tool was created to explore these chemical mixtures in predator-prey pairs. Predominant chemicals, defined as the most prevalent substances detected in prey-predator pairs were identified through this innovative approach. The analysis established the most frequently co-occurring substances in chemical mixtures from AP&P in the marine and freshwater environments. Freshwater and marine environments shared 23 chemicals among their top 25 predominant chemicals. Legacy chemical, including perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS), brominated diphenyl ethers (BDEs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), hexachlorobenzene and mercury were dominant chemicals in both environments. Furthermore, N-acetylaminoantipyrine was a predominant pharmaceutical in both environments. The LIFE APEX chemical mixture application (https://norman-data.eu/LIFE_APEX_Mixtures) was proven to be useful to establish most prevalent compounds in terms of number of detected counts in prey-predator pairs. Nonetheless, further research is needed to establish food chain associations of the predominant chemicals.

This study was financed by the European Union through the project LIFE17 ENV/SK/000355 ‘Systematic use of contaminant data from apex predators and their prey in chemicals management’. Naturalis Biodiversity Center wishes to thank M. Geut (A Seal, Seal Recovery Centre, Stellendam) and A. Oosterbaan (Ecomare, Texel) for the Dutch seal samples. Ringed seal and bearded seal sampling was supported by the Environmental Specimen Bank, Norway and the Norwegian Polar Institute. The samples of cetaceans from northwestern Spain were provided by the regional stranding network "Coordinadora para o Estudo dos Mamíferos Mariños (CEMMA). The authors would like to thank Dr. Iwona Pawliczka for provision of samples.

Peer reviewed