Weakly electric fish for biomonitoring water quality

Environmental pollution is a major issue that calls for suitable monitoring systems. The number of possible pollutants of municipal and industrial water grows annually as new chemicals are developed. Technical devices for pollutant detection are constructed in a way to detect a specific and known array of pollutants. Biological systems react to lethal or non-lethal environmental changes without pre-adjustment, and a wide variety have been employed as broad-range monitors for water quality. Weakly electric fish have proven particularly useful for the purpose of biomonitoring municipal and industrial waters. The frequency of their electric organ discharges directly correlates with the quality of the surrounding water and, in this way, concentrations of toxicants down to the nanomolar range have been successfully detected by these organisms. We have reviewed the literature on biomonitoring studies to date, comparing advantages and disadvantages of this test system and summarizing the lowest concentrations of various toxicants tested. Eighteen publications were identified investigating 35 different chemical substances and using six different species of weakly electric fish.

环境污染是亟需搭建适配监测体系的重大问题。随着新型化学品不断研发问世，市政与工业水体中的潜在污染物种类逐年递增。现有污染物检测设备仅能针对特定且已知的污染物集合开展检测。生物系统可无需预先适配，直接对致死或非致死性环境变化做出响应，诸多生物类群已被用作水质广谱监测工具。弱电鱼（Weakly electric fish）已被证实可有效应用于市政与工业水体的生物监测工作。其电器官放电的频率与周遭水体质量直接相关，借此这类生物可成功检测至纳摩尔级浓度的有毒物质。本综述回顾了截至目前的生物监测相关研究文献，对比了该测试系统的优劣，并总结了各类受试有毒物质的最低检测浓度。最终共检索到18篇相关文献，其研究共涉及35种不同化学物质，并采用了6种不同的弱电鱼物种。