AIMS To identify the most efficient techniques for the separation of micro-organisms from coastal sediments and, using these techniques, to determine the concentration of faecal indicator organisms in recreational coastal water and sediment. METHODS AND RESULTS Sediment samples were taken from a range of recreational coastal sites and subjected to various physical techniques to separate micro...

Competitive PCR (cPCR) is a quantitative PCR approach based on the addition of an internal standard to the PCR mixture. In this study, cPCR was used to quantitate genetically tagged cyanobacteria in Baltic Sea sediment. The cyanobacterium Synechocystis 6803-luc has a chromosomal insertion of the firefly luciferase gene, luc, as a marker detectable by PCR. A competitive standard was constructed ...

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals with estrogenic activity (e.g., alkylphenols) have been detected in coastal Japan. We aimed to determine estrogenic activity in extracts of river water, seawater, sediments, and sediment cores from Tokyo Bay by in vitro gene expression assay. Fifty-one of 57 extracts had some estrogenic activity. E2 equivalents (ng E2 equivalents per gram dry weight or per liter a...

Reduced streamflow via flow diversion has the potential to limit the sediment-transport capacity of downstream channels and lead to accumulation of fine sediments and habitat degradation. To investigate, we examined the effects of variable levels of flow diversion on fine-sediment deposition, hydraulic conditions and geomorphic alteration. Our study consisted of a detailed field analysis pairin...

A study was carried out on the occurrence of chitinolytic bacteria inhabiting surface water, water above the sediment and bottom sediments of lakes: Jeziorak, Jeziorak Maty and Tynwald. The greatest amounts of them were found in demersal water and in bottom sediment surface stratum. However, the percentage share of chitinolytic bacteria proved greater in deep water (9.35%) than in bottom sedime...

The toxicity of sediments collected from depositional and erosional substrates at two locations on the Cuyahoga River in northeastern Ohio was compared. Upstream and downstream locations from the Akron Water Pollution Control Station (Akron WPCS) were selected to evaluate effects of the Akron WPCS effluent on sediment toxicity. Seven-day Ceriodaphnia dubia bioassays were conducted on sediment e...

A microbiological study was conducted in the area north and northeast of Svalbard, Arctic Ocean. Samples were taken in surface microlayers, ice, water column (down to 300 m) and sediment (maximum depth 3920 m). ATP-content in the upper 100 m was between 8 and 80 ng I-'; total bacterial numbers varied between 0.4 and 4.4 105 ml-l. Ice-samples contained high amounts of ATP (max. 120 ng I-'). Bact...

Clogging of permeable interlocking concrete pavements (PICP) due to the sediment contained in stormwater runoff has been shown to significantly reduce their infiltration capacity over time. Numerous studies have used laboratory-based PICP models and synthetic stormwater in an attempt to replicate and predict the clogging processes that occur in PICP field installations. A variety of sediment ty...

The acoustic lance is an instrument developed to obtain in situ compressional wave velocity and attenuation ~Q! profiles for a sedimentary layer of several meters thickness at the sediment– seawater interface. The self-contained instrument consists of ten independent recording channels with a linear array of receivers embedded in the seafloor below a broadband acoustic source. It provides in si...