Echo

Canadian researchers shine new light on old Great Lakes contaminant

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By Jeff Gillies, gilliesj@msu.edu
Great Lakes Echo
May 19, 2009

In the alphabet soup of Great Lakes contaminants, PCBs, PCDDs and PBDEs usually rule the broth. But in a recent study, Canadian scientists took a closer look at another noodle. They examined a group of seldom-studied, dioxin-like contaminants called polychlorinated naphthalenes, or PCNs. These chemicals can have toxic effects including chloracne and liver damage. And although industry abandoned their use 30 years ago, the researchers still found the chemicals in lake trout collected from Lake Ontario from 1979 and 2004.

Wildlife

Pheromones in river traps attract sea lampreys

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Scientists have found another promising weapon in the battle against sea lampreys, strong evidence that they may win the war against one of the Great Lakes’ most infamous invaders.

Researchers at Michigan State University have begun field tests on a chemical compound that tricks the lampreys and lures them into traps.

Echo

Great Lakes fish eaters less contaminated than a decade ago

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Anglers who ate Great Lakes fish have 33 percent fewer PCBs and 43 percent less DDT in their bodies than they did a decade ago, largely because they changed their diet and switched to less contaminated fish, according to a study by Wisconsin researchers. The scientists compared blood drawn from people in 1994-1995 with blood from the same people drawn roughly nine years later. Most of the 293 men and women tested were sports fishers and boat captains who consumed large amounts of Great Lakes fish. One reason for the decline “is that your body excretes these chemicals over time as they slowly get metabolized,” said Lynda Knobeloch, study leader and senior toxicologist at the Wisconsin Department of Health Services. “The other is that exposure levels are much, much lower than what they were 30 years ago.”

Polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs—industrial compounds used largely to insulate electrical transformers—and the pesticide DDT were banned in the United States in the 1970s.

Echo

Great Lakes fishermen less contaminated than a decade ago

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Anglers who ate Great Lakes fish have 33 percent fewer PCBs and 43 percent less DDT in their bodies than they did a decade ago, largely because they changed their diet and switched to less contaminated fish, according to a study by Wisconsin researchers.