Applicability of artificial seawater as a rearing seawater for toxicity tests of hazardous chemicals by marine fish species

The applicability of artificial seawater (APHA and LF) as a rearing seawater to examine the acute toxicity and bioconcentration of hazardous chemicals was investigated. The concentrations of hazardous metals in these artificial seawaters were determined and the vawes of LC50 and BCF for the artificial seawaters were compared with those for natural seawater.The concentrations of Zn, Cd, Pb, Cu, Fe, Mn, As and Sb in the artificial seawaters were as low as those reported in natural seawater. The LC50 values of Cu and Cr(VI) in the artificial seawaters were about half of those obtained in natural seawater. On the other hand, no significant change was observed for LC50 of Hg, PCP-Na and PNP. EDTA included in the artificial seawater reduced the acutetoxicity of Cu. Differences in BCFs of Cd, α-HCH, TBP and PCP-Na were also small between natural and the artificial seawaters used in the experiments. These results suggest that artificial seawater not containing a large amount of EDTA (APHA or LF) was a suitable substitute for natural seawater for the toxicity tests using marine fish species.