Downscaling scenarios of future land use and land cover changes using a participatory approach: an application to mountain risk assessment in the Pyrenees (France)

Regional Environmental Change - Better understanding the pathways through which future socioeconomic changes might influence land use and land cover changes (LULCCs) is a crucial step in accurately...     

Development and implementation of eco-genomic tools for aquatic ecosystem biomonitoring: the SYNAQUA French-Swiss program

The effectiveness of environmental protection measures is based on the early identification and diagnosis of anthropogenic pressures. Similarly, restoration actions require precise monitoring of changes in the ecological quality of ecosystems, in order to highlight their effectiveness. Monitoring the ecological quality relies on bioindicators, which are organisms revealing the pressures exerted on the environment through the composition of their communities. Their implementation, based on the morphological identification of species, is expensive because it requires time and experts in taxonomy. Recent genomic tools should provide access to reliable and high-throughput environmental monitoring by directly inferring the composition of bioindicators’ communities from their DNA (metabarcoding). The French-Swiss program SYNAQUA (INTERREG France-Switzerland 2017–2019) proposes to use and validate the tools of environmental genomic for biomonitoring and aims ultimately at their implementation in the regulatory bio-surveillance. SYNAQUA will test the metabarcoding approach focusing on two bioindicators, diatoms, and aquatic oligochaetes, which are used in freshwater biomonitoring in France and Switzerland. To go towards the renewal of current biomonitoring practices, SYNAQUA will (1) bring together different actors: scientists, environmental managers, consulting firms, and biotechnological companies, (2) apply this approach on a large scale to demonstrate its relevance, (3) propose robust and reliable tools, and (4) raise public awareness and train the various actors likely to use these new tools. Biomonitoring approaches based on such environmental genomic tools should address the European need for reliable, higher-throughput monitoring to improve the protection of aquatic environments under multiple pressures, guide their restoration, and follow their evolution.     

Hg concentrations and stable isotope variations in tropical fish species of a gold-mining-impacted watershed in French Guiana

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - The aim of the study was to determine if gold-mining activities could impact the mercury (Hg) concentrations and isotopic signatures in freshwater...     

Comparison of different physiological parameter responses in Lemna minor and Scenedesmus obliquus exposed to herbicide flumioxazin

The sensitivity of different physiological parameters in Scenedesmus obliquus and Lemna minor exposed to herbicide (flumioxazin) was investigated to indicate the most convenient and sensitive parameter. To assess toxicity of flumioxazin, we used a panel of biomarkers: pigment contents, chlorophyll fluorescence parameters and antioxidative enzyme activities. Algae and duckweed were exposed to 48-h IC50 for growth rate. In L. minor, the sensitivity of the parameters was as follows: QN > Oxygen emmision > phiS(PSII) > QP > phi(PSII) > CAT, GR > Pigment> APO > Growth. For S. obliquus, this ranking was as follows: CAT > Oxygen emission > QP > APO > GR > Pigment > phiS(PSII) > Growth > phi(PSII) > QN (from the greatest to the least sensitive). The results demonstrated that the observed toxicity is related not only to interspecific variations but also to the selected parameter.     

Glyphosate adsorption in soils compared to herbicides replaced with the introduction of glyphosate resistant crops

Use of glyphosate resistant crops was helpful in addressing observed increases in environmental contamination by herbicides. Glyphosate is a broad-spectrum herbicide, and its behaviour-as well as that of other herbicides-in soils is an important consideration for the overall environmental evaluation of genetically resistant crop introduction. However, few data have been published comparing glyphosate behaviour in soil to that of the herbicides that would be replaced by introduction of glyphosate resistant crops. This work compares glyphosate adsorption in soil with that of other herbicides frequently used in rape (trifluralin and metazachlor), sugarbeet (metamitron) and corn (sulcotrione). Herbicide adsorption was characterised in surface soils and in the complete soils profiles through kinetics and isotherms using batch equilibration methods. Pedological and molecular structure factors controlling the adsorption of all five herbicides were investigated. Glyphosate was the most strongly adsorbed herbicide, thus having the weakest potential for mobility in soils. Glyphosate adsorption was dependent on its ionisable structure in relation to soil pH, and on soil copper, amorphous iron and phosphate content. Trifluralin adsorption was almost equivalent to glyphosate adsorption, whereas metazachlor, metamitron and sulcotrione adsorption were lower. Trifluralin, metazachlor and metamitron adsorption increased with soil organic carbon content. Sulcotrione was the least adsorbed herbicide in alkaline soils, but its adsorption increased when pH decreased. Ranking the adsorption properties among the five herbicides, glyphosate and trifluralin have the lowest availability and mobility in soils, but the former has the broadest spectrum for weed control.     

Toward the reduction of water consumption in the vegetable-processing industry through membrane technology: case study of a carrot-processing plant

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - The food industry consumes large amounts of clean, potable water and in turn generates a significant amount of wastewater. In order to minimize water...     

A 25-year record of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in soils amended with sewage sludges

We studied polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in crop soils amended with 1000 tonnes dry weight of sewage sludges per 10,000 m² from 1974 to 1992, then after sludges addition from 1993 to 1999. The absence of variations of total PAHs levels of control soils, averaging at 123 μg/Kg, shows the absence of horizontal contamination. During sludges addition, the total PAHs levels in amended soils increased from 232 to 402 μg/Kg. Seven years after sludges addition, it decreased to 275 μg/Kg, which is still more than twice –the levels of control soils. This finding shows that sludges PAHs are preserved in crop soils for long periods of time, on a human scale.     

Road accidents,an occupational risk

Road accidents sustained at work represent between 20% and 40% of work fatalities in most industrialised countries, yet few data on occupational road accident risk factors have been published. A case control study was performed to assess the role of work-related risk factors in the occurrence of occupational road accidents. A preliminary qualitative study was carried out to identify possible occupational factors in occupational road accidents, and to draw up the case control study. Cases were recruited from the Rhône road trauma registry (France), controls from voting lists. A telephone interview was performed. Exposure to road risk was measured as a percentage of work time. One hundred and forty-six cases and 440 matched controls were interviewed. Accident risk was found to increase with exposure. Driving was associated with more difficult working conditions than found in jobs not involving driving. These difficulties, however, were not systematically associated with increased occupational road accident risk. Among factors which still emerge after adjustment for road risk exposure, there are scheduling issues (inflexible schedule organisation, lack of consecutive rest-days, lack of flexibility in performing the work), difficulties of communication with superiors, low seniority in the activity, low educational level and physical constraints at work. This study highlights some possible occupational road accident risk factors. Given the chosen case/control methodology, the findings may be considered as advancing our knowledge of the subject, but need confirmation by further studies.     

Leachate recirculation: moisture content assessment by means of a geophysical technique

Bioreactor technology is a waste treatment concept consisting in speeding up the biodegradation of landfilled waste by optimizing its moisture content through leachate recirculation. The measurement of variations in waste moisture content is critical in the design and control of bioreactors. Conventional methods such as direct physical sampling of waste reach their limits due to the interference with the waste matrix. This paper reviews geophysical measurements such as electrical direct current and electromagnetic slingram methods for measuring the electrical conductivity. Electrical conductivity is a property, which is linked to both moisture and temperature and can provide useful indications on the biodegradation environment in the waste mass. The study reviews three site experiments: a first experimentation shows the advantages (correlation between conductive anomaly and water seepage) but also the limits of geophysical interpretation; the two other sites allow the leachate recirculation to be tracked by studying the relative resistivity variation versus time from electrical 2D imaging. Even if some improvements are necessary to consider geophysical measurements as a real bioreactor monitoring tool, results are promising and could lead to the use of electrical 2D imaging in bioreactor designing.