Western Airborne Contaminants Assessment Project

Drs. Carl Schreck, Department of Fisheries and Wildlife and Michael Kent lead the Fish Studies of the Western Airborne Contaminants Assessment Project (WACAP) http://www2.nature.nps.gov/ard/aqmon/air_toxics/wacap/ (pdf)

The WACAP, funded by the National Parks Service Air Resource Division, was created to investigate the risks of long-range air pollution to ecosystems and food webs in western National Parks. Several investigators study contaminants in snow, water, air and lake sediments. The fish group investigates the association of chemical contaminants with physiological and pathological changes in fish collected from various high mountain lakes in the western U.S. Chemistry on fish tissues is conducted by Dr. Staci Simonich, Dept. Environmental and Molecular Toxicology here at OSU. One end point we are investigating is the accumulation of macrophage aggregates in the liver, kidney and spleen in association with contaminant concentrations. This technique has been shown by Dr. Fournie, US EPA, Gulf Breeze, Florida and others to be an histological indicator in fish for exposure to contaminants (see Fournie et al. 2001. Utility of splenic macrophage aggregates as an indicator of fish exposure to degraded environments. J. Aquat. Anim. Health 13: 105-116.)

Numerous melanin-laden macrophage aggregates in the spleen of a hard head catfish from a polluted site (A) versus a catfish spleen from a clean site. Courtesy of Dr. J. Fournie.