The Hai River Basin (HRB) is one of the most polluted river basins in China. The basin suffers from various types of pollutants including heavy metals and nutrients due to a high population density and rapid economic development in this area. We assessed the relationship between heavy metal accumulation by periphyton playing an important role in fluvial food webs and eutrophication in the HRB. ...

We maintained elevated but moderate concentrations of nitrogen and phosphorus continuously for 2 years in a heavily shaded headwater stream and compared effects on stream periphyton with a reference stream. Both streams were sampled for 1 year before treatment. Some measures of periphyton biomass (ash-free dry mass and chlorophyll a) responded positively to enrichment. Increased chlorophyll a w...

Increasing anthropogenic CO2 emissions to the atmosphere are causing a rise in pCO2 concentrations in the ocean surface and lowering pH. To predict the effects of these changes, we need to improve our understanding of the responses of marine primary producers since these drive biogeochemical cycles and profoundly affect the structure and function of benthic habitats. The effects of increasing C...

Effects of the antimicrobial agent triclosan to natural periphyton communities (biofilms, comprising primarily microalgae and bacteria) were assessed in two independent experiments during spring and summer. For that purpose a semi-static test system was used in which periphyton was exposed to a concentration range of 5-9054 nmol/L triclosan. Effects on algae were analyzed as content and composi...

Pollution in the natural aquatic environment is erratic and manifests as temporary increments of chemical concentrations, pulses. Traditional ecotoxicological testing does not consider intermittent exposures and does not consider the post-exposure period even though latent effects may occur. Sugar kelp (Saccharina latissima, L.) was exposed to pulses of seven antifouling compounds with differen...

Using batch cultures, we determined transformation rate coefficients for microbial transformation of 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid butoxyethyl ester (2,4-DBE) in periphyton-dominated ecosystems. Rates of 2,4-DBE loss were measured over short periods of time (usually less than 10 h), and first-order transformation rate coefficients (k(1)) were determined under the specific conditions of low 2,4...

We studied the long-term acclimatization of freshwater periphyton communities exposed to low and high ultraviolet radiation (UVR) intensities that simulate UVR doses received by lowland and high-mountain streams of central Europe. To assess changes induced by UVR, we compared the community structure (species and biomass), function (photosynthetic yield), and tolerance to UVR and cadmium of peri...

Freshwater gastropods play key roles in shallow aquatic ecosystems, with a central position the periphyton–gastropod–fish trophic pathway, as they feed on periphyton and are preyed by animals of higher levels. Thus, it is great interest to explore how climate change impacts gastropod community cascading effects periphyton. Here, we constructed simplified, lake food web 24 large mesocosm tanks s...

Periphyton grazing by the marine isopod Idothea chelipes was studied by exposing periphyton grown on glass slides to a gradient of grazer densities. An analysis of the algal growth rates and their relationships to grazer density revealed two groups of algae. The unicellular diatoms Licmophora ehrenbergii, Fragilaria tabulata, Navicula spp., Cocconeis costata, and the green alga Ulothrix implexa...