Anthropogenic effects on the biota: towards a new system of principles and criteria for analysis of ecological hazards.

Ostroumov S. A. Anthropogenic effects on the biota: towards a new system of principles and criteria for analysis of ecological hazards. Rivista di Biologia / Biology Forum. 2003. 96: 159-170. [ISSN 0035-6050]
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12852181;
http://www.tilgher.it/(ekdo002s40etdh55stgyltvf)/index.aspx?lang=eng&tpr=4&act=abs&id=650;
The currently accepted system of criteria for evaluating environmental and ecological hazards of man-made chemicals (pollutants) is vulnerable to criticism. In this paper, a new concept of the system of approaches towards criteria for evaluating the ecological hazard from man-made impact is proposed. It is suggested to assess the man-made impacts (including effects of pollutants and xenobiotics) on the biota according to the following four levels of disturbance in biological and ecological systems: (1) the level of individual responses; (2) the level of aggregated responses of groups of organisms; (3) the level of stability and integrity of the ecosystem; (4) the level of contributions of the ecosystem to biospheric processes. On the basis of the author's experimental studies, an example is given of how to apply the proposed approach and the system of criteria to the analysis of concrete experimental data. To exemplify the efficiency of the proposed approach, it is shown how to use it to analyze new data on effects of a synthetic surfactant on water filtering by bivalves. It is concluded that the proposed approach will be helpful in better assessing environmental and ecological hazards from anthropogenic effects on biota, including effects of man-made chemicals polluting ecosystems. The following key issues were presented and analyzed in the paper: 1. The traditional approach to classification of chemicals according to their environmental hazards. 2. A new approach to the analysis of hazards of anthropogenic effects on the biota. 3. An example of applying the new approach to the analysis of environmental and ecological hazards.
The paper was cited by international experts, e.g., in the paper: R. Grande ; S. Di Pietro; E. Di Campli; S. Di Bartolomeo; B. Filareto; L. Cellini. Bio-toxicological assays to test water and sediment quality. Journal of Environmental Science and Health, Part A, Volume 42, Issue 1 2007 (January), pages 33 – 38 [Affiliation of the Authors: Rossella Grande a; Stefania Di Pietro ab; Emanuela Di Campli a; Soraya Di Bartolomeo a; Barbara Filareto b; Luigina Cellini a;
a Department of Biomedical Sciences, University “G. d'Annunzio,”, Chieti, Italy;
b Agency for the Protection of Environment, Pescara, Italy] DOI: 10.1080/10934520601015446; http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a768424372&db=all;