Biotic and Abiotic Factors Influencing Arsenic Biogeochemistry and Toxicity in Fluvial Ecosystems: A Review

Laura Barral-Fraga, María Teresa Barral, Keeley L. MacNeill, Diego Martiñá-Prieto, Soizic Morin, María Carolina Rodríguez-Castro, Baigal-Amar Tuulaikhuu and Helena Guasch
Additional contact information
Laura Barral-Fraga: Grup de recerca en Ecologia aquàtica continental (GRECO), Departament de Ciències Ambientals, Universitat de Girona, 17071 Girona, Spain
María Teresa Barral: Instituto CRETUS, Departmento de Edafoloxía e Química Agrícola, Facultade de Farmacia, Campus Vida, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain
Keeley L. MacNeill: Forest Ecosystems and Society, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA
Diego Martiñá-Prieto: Instituto CRETUS, Departmento de Edafoloxía e Química Agrícola, Facultade de Farmacia, Campus Vida, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain
Soizic Morin: INRAE—Institut National de Recherche en Agriculture, Alimentation et Environnement, UR EABX—Equipe ECOVEA, 33612 Cestas Cedex, France
María Carolina Rodríguez-Castro: INEDES—Instituto de Ecología y Desarrollo Sustentable (UNLu-CONICET), Universidad Nacional de Luján, 6700 Buenos Aires, Argentina
Baigal-Amar Tuulaikhuu: School of Agroecology, Mongolian University of Life Sciences, Khoroo 11, Ulaanbaatar 17024, Mongolia
Helena Guasch: Grup de recerca en Ecologia aquàtica continental (GRECO), Departament de Ciències Ambientals, Universitat de Girona, 17071 Girona, Spain

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 7, 1-28

Abstract: This review is focused on the biogeochemistry of arsenic in freshwaters and, especially, on the key role that benthic microalgae and prokaryotic communities from biofilms play together in through speciation, distribution, and cycling. These microorganisms incorporate the dominant iAs (inorganic arsenic) form and may transform it to other arsenic forms through metabolic or detoxifying processes. These transformations have a big impact on the environmental behavior of arsenic because different chemical forms exhibit differences in mobility and toxicity. Moreover, exposure to toxicants may alter the physiology and structure of biofilms, leading to changes in ecosystem function and trophic relations. In this review we also explain how microorganisms (i.e., biofilms) can influence the effects of arsenic exposure on other key constituents of aquatic ecosystems such as fish. At the end, we present two real cases of fluvial systems with different origins of arsenic exposure (natural vs. anthropogenic) that have improved our comprehension of arsenic biogeochemistry and toxicity in freshwaters, the Pampean streams (Argentina) and the Anllóns River (Galicia, Spain). We finish with a briefly discussion of what we consider as future research needs on this topic. This work especially contributes to the general understanding of biofilms influencing arsenic biogeochemistry and highlights the strong impact of nutrient availability on arsenic toxicity for freshwater (micro) organisms.

Keywords: arsenic; biofilm; microalgae; bacteria; phosphate; biogeochemistry; speciation; toxicity; ecotoxicology; trophic interactions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/7/2331/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/7/2331/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:7:p:2331-:d:338940

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().