Details of Award
NERC Reference : NE/D007755/1
An integrative approach to understanding soil pollutants' effects on earthworms
Grant Award
- Principal Investigator:
- Dr JG Bundy, Imperial College London, Div of Biomedical Sciences
- Co-Investigator:
- Professor DJ Spurgeon, UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Pollution (Wallingford)
- Co-Investigator:
- Professor P Kille, Cardiff University, School of Biosciences
- Grant held at:
- Imperial College London, Div of Biomedical Sciences
- Science Area:
- Terrestrial
- Overall Classification:
- Terrestrial
- ENRIs:
- Pollution and Waste
- Environmental Risks and Hazards
- Science Topics:
- Ecotoxicology
- Environmental Genomics
- Abstract:
- Maintaining soil quality is vital for the preservation of biological diversity of soil communities, and also has agricultural implications, as polluted soils may affect crop growth. Earthworms play a key ecological role in soils: they speed up the rate of carbon turnover by physical mixing and grinding of soils and plant material. Thus, it is extremely important to protect earthworms from pollution, in order both to preserve biodiversity, and to maintain soil ecological functioning. They can also serve as sentinel species for understanding how significant the effects of soil pollution really are, i.e. if earthworm populations are impacted it is an indication that contaminant levels are of real environmental concern. We will study the effect of chemical pollutants on the well-characterized epigeic earthworm species Lumbricus rubellus, using four model chemicals that are representative of broad classes of pollutants: copper and cadmium (potentially toxic metals), atrazine (pesticides), and fluoranthene (aromatic organic compounds, produced both by natural processes and as industrial wastes). This will be done by building on samples and data generated by an existing research consortium (NER/T/S/2002/00021, 'Exploiting terrestrial sentinel and model species to integrate tiers of biological response to pollution'). This project has already carried out reproducible exposures at ecologically relevant sub-lethal levels for three of these chemicals (cadmium, atrazine, fluoranthene); copper-exposed worms will be available as well. The metabolic effects of these pollutants will be assessed using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy to profile extracts of the earthworm tissue. NMR is a non-targeted universal detector for small-molecule metabolites, and thus can provide a profile or fingerprint of the earthworms' metabolism. The spectra are complex and information-rich, and therefore multivariate pattern-recognition methods are needed for optimum analysis and interpretation of the data. This combination of non-targeted metabolite profiling together with multivariate data handling is known as metabolomics. The metabolomic data will be complemented by transcriptomic microarray data (profiles of thousands of genes whose expression may be affected by the chemicals), and population end-points (e.g. number of cocoons laid by each worm, growth rates). Thus, we are proposing an integrative approach to understanding this important biological and environmental question. The so-called 'omic' (comprehensive profiling) data sets will allow us to develop hypotheses about how the different chemicals cause toxic and developmental effects in earthworms. However, often it is difficult to use omic data to generate any information that is relevant to actual field populations. Critically, we will be able to relate the omic data sets to life-cycle models that have direct relevance to ecological effects on earthworm populations. This will give us the power to interpret the metabolomic observations in a way that is truly significant for protecting earthworms from different chemical pollutants.
- NERC Reference:
- NE/D007755/1
- Grant Stage:
- Completed
- Scheme:
- Small Grants (FEC)
- Grant Status:
- Closed
- Programme:
- Small Grants
This grant award has a total value of £48,677
FDAB - Financial Details (Award breakdown by headings)
| DI - Other Costs | Indirect - Indirect Costs | DA - Investigators | DA - Estate Costs | DI - Staff | DI - T&S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| £5,505 | £19,463 | £3,373 | £7,077 | £12,685 | £575 |
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