Ants and their nests as indicators for industrial heavy metal contamination

Environmental Pollution
Oksana SkaldinaJ Sorvari

Abstract

Ants accumulate heavy metals and respond to pollution with modification in species composition, community structure, altered behaviour and immunity. However, the levels of heavy metals in ants' nests and explicit individual-level responses towards heavy metals have not been revealed. We found that red wood ants Formica lugubris accumulate high and correlated values of such heavy metals as Al, Cd, Co, Cu, Fe, Ni, Pb and Zn both in ants and nest material near cobalt smelter in Finland. Relative differences in metal concentrations were higher in nests than in ants. The highest values were obtained for elements such as Co (36.6), Zn (14.9), Cd (9.7), Pb (8.5), Cu (7.4), Ni (6.4), As (4.7), Cr (2.9) and Fe (2.4) in nest material, and Co (32.7), Cd (6.3), Pb (6), Fe (2.8), Ni (2.9) and Zn (2.1) in ants. In industrial and reference areas, ants have no differences in size, but differed in dry and residual body mass. In polluted areas, F. lugubris had less melanised heads, but not thoraxes. The sensitivity of cuticular colouration in red wood ants subjected to heavy metal pollution might be related to metal-binding properties of melanins. The overall results are useful for the improvement of biomonitoring techniques using ants as indica...Continue Reading

Citations

Mar 4, 2020·Insects·Heike Feldhaar, Oliver Otti
Jun 12, 2020·Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society·Luciana ElizaldeGabriela I Pirk
Sep 3, 2020·Oecologia·Oluwatobi BadejoJouni Sorvari
Jun 16, 2019·Animals : an Open Access Journal From MDPI·Cuncheng LiuHuaiying Yao
May 20, 2020·Environmental Science and Pollution Research International·Oksana SkaldinaJouni Sorvari
Nov 8, 2020·Environmental Pollution·Mateusz Okrutniak, Irena M Grześ
Feb 3, 2021·Environmental Pollution·Armin KaveheiGrant C Hose
Mar 24, 2021·Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety·Marcela de Matos BarbosaMaria Fernanda Hornos Carneiro
May 22, 2021·Environmental Pollution·Fuxiang YangAiming Zhou
May 26, 2021·The Science of the Total Environment·Coline MonchaninMathieu Lihoreau

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