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Seasonal variation of biomarker responses in Cantareus aspersus and physic-chemical properties of soils from Northeast Algeria

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Louiza Douafer at Centre Universitaire de Mila
Louiza Douafer
Nedjoua Zaidi at University of Skikda
Nedjoua Zaidi
Noureddine Soltani at Badji Moktar-Annaba University
Noureddine Soltani
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Abstract and Figures

This study belongs to the biomonitoring program of soil qualities using a land snail, Cantareus aspersus, as bioindicator. The metal-soil contamination in some sites (National Park of El Kala (NPK), El Bouni, Sidi Amar, Nechmaya, and Guelma) located in Northeast Algeria were determined during two seasons (winter and spring 2015, 2016). Glutathione (GSH) content and acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity were significantly decreased in snails collected during spring as compared with those noticed during winter under bioclimate change. In addition, a significant difference between various sites was observed, depending on the proximity to pollution sources. The significant variation of biomarker levels is a function of the physic-chemical properties of soils when they positively correlated with EC, H, and OM, and negatively correlated with all metallic elements. Moreover, Fe and Al2O3 are the most abundant in all the sites, and the most polluted site was found as that of El Bouni, followed by Sidi Amar, Nechmaya, and Guelma, since NPK is the less polluted site and considered a reference site. The tested biomarkers are sensitive oxidative parameters in snails exposed to pollution correlated significantly with the soil physic-chemical properties and metallic element contents in soil. Indeed, C. aspersus could be used as sentinel species in field monitoring of Mediterranean climate regions.
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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Seasonal variation of biomarker responses in Cantareus aspersus
and physic-chemical properties of soils from Northeast Algeria
Louiza Douafer
1,2
&Nedjoua Zaidi
3
&Noureddine Soltani
1
Received: 31 December 2019 /Accepted: 30 March 2020
#Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract
This study belongs to the biomonitoring program of soil qualities using a land snail, Cantareus aspersus, as bioindicator. The metal-
soil contamination in some sites (National Park of El Kala (NPK), El Bouni, Sidi Amar, Nechmaya, and Guelma) located in
Northeast Algeria were determined during two seasons (winter and spring 2015, 2016). Glutathione (GSH) content and acetylcho-
linesterase (AChE) activity were significantly decreased in snails collected during spring as compared with those noticed during
winter under bioclimate change. In addition, a significant difference between various sites was observed, depending on the
proximity to pollution sources. The significant variation of biomarker levels is a function of the physic-chemical properties of soils
when they positively correlated with EC, H, and OM, and negatively correlated with all metallic elements. Moreover, Fe and Al
2
O
3
are the most abundant in all the sites, and the most polluted site was found as that of El Bouni, followed by Sidi Amar, Nechmaya,
and Guelma, since NPK is the less polluted site and considered a reference site. The tested biomarkers are sensitive oxidative
parameters in snails exposed to pollution correlated significantly with the soil physic-chemical properties and metallic element
contents in soil. Indeed, C. aspersus could be used as sentinel species in field monitoring of Mediterranean climate regions.
Keywords Biomonitoring .Biomarkers .Cantareus aspersus .Metallic elements .Soil contamination
Introduction
The increased anthropogenic activities resulted in a significant
environmental contamination impact on human and other living
organisms at different levels of biological organization
(molecular, cellular, and physiological levels) (Lionetto et al.
2019). Additionally, pollution affects the ecosystem biodiversi-
ty, the natural resources, and the quality of soil and waters
(Landrigan et al. 2018). Hence, scientists have drawn a great
attention in characterizing and monitoring the quality of biota to
evaluate the impact of global pollution on human health (Nica
et al. 2012). Many trace metal elements are naturally ubiquitous
in the Earth’s crust and atmosphere, but human industrial activ-
ities contaminate the environment and cause unnaturally high
levels of toxic metallic elements. Thus, the uncontrolled waste
disposal, runoff, and application of metallic element-laden
chemical products release many hazardous metals affecting,
therefore, the quality of biota (Basopo and Ngabaza 2015).
According to oxidation states, metals can be highly reactive
and consequently they become toxic for most organisms. Due
to their long lifetime in soils, they cause harmful effects on the
environment (Menon et al. 2007). As reported, metallic ele-
ments are bioaccumulative in living organisms (e.g., land snails
(Cantareus aspersus)), and thus, they cause serious damages to
organ functions and changes in reproduction (Carbone and
Faggio 2019). In this regard, several previous works (Larba
and Soltani 2014; Belabed and Soltani 2018) have shown that
metallic element pollution is pervasive in the Annaba region.
Responsible Editor: Philippe Garrigues
*Louiza Douafer
ldouafer@centre-univ-mila.dz
Nedjoua Zaidi
n.zaidi@univ-skikda.dz
Noureddine Soltani
noureddine.soltani@univ-annaba.org
1
Department of Biology, Laboratory of Applied Animal Biology,
Faculty of Sciences, University Badji Mokhtar of Annaba,
23000 Annaba, Algeria
2
Department of Biology, Faculty of Sciences, University of Mila,
43000 Mila, Algeria
3
Department of Natural and Life Sciences, Laboratory for the
Optimization of Agricultural in Subhumid Areas, Faculty of
Sciences, University of Skikda, 21000 Skikda, Algeria
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-08694-4
/ Published online: 17 April 2020
Environmental Science and Pollution Research (2020) 27:24145–24161
Content courtesy of Springer Nature, terms of use apply. Rights reserved.
... This land snail integrates three pathways of exposure: digestive (ingestion of soil particles, up to 40% to satisfy its physiological needs), cutaneous (transfer from the soil to the snail foot), and pulmonary (inhalation of soil particles) (de Scheifler et al., 2006;Gimbert et al., 2008a;de Vaufleury, 2015). The use of oxidative stress biomarkers is of potential interest for the assessment of the pollutant's impact or seasonal variation in animals under field conditions (Regoli & Principato, 1995;Verlecar et al., 2008;Abdel-Halim et al., 2013;Larba & Soltani, 2014;Bairi et al., 2018;Douafer et al., 2020). Moreover, the interaction between xenobiotics and the components of the antioxidant defense systems plays an important role in the ecotoxicological response of an organism to its environment (Regoli et al., 2006). ...
... Land snails have also been widely used as a sentinel species for the assessment of pollution in terrestrial ecosystems (Larba & Soltani 2014;Hamdi-Ourfella & Soltani, 2014;De Vaufleury 2015;Bairi et al., 2018;Douafer et al., 2020). They accumulate various contaminants in their soft tissues, especially the digestive gland, as well as they are helpful species in monitoring exposure to trace metals, agrochemicals, urban pollution, and electromagnetic agents (Regoli et al., 2006). ...
... Several studies have investigated the soil quality and modulated the soil properties (soil pH, organic carbon, and iron oxides) of metal bioavailability to snails, and procedure for ranking field sites based on the evaluation of the metal transfer to the land snail C. aspersum (Pauget et al., 2013a, b;Larba & Soltani 2014;Mortensen et al., 2018;Douafer et al., 2020;Lozen et al., 2020). Therefore, the assessment of pollution effects on this organism could also be of concern for potential effects on human Assessment of soil metallic contamination in Algeria by use of terrestrial gastropod: Cornu aspersum bes. ...
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... Consequently, they can be used as suitable indices for biomonitoring of the contaminated soil [33,35]. For example, significant correlations between glutathione levels and acetylcholinesterase activity in the organism C. aspersus and the levels of hazardous elements in the soil have been reported by Douafer et al. [36]. Similarly to land snails, various epigean beetles (Coleoptera) have been studied as possible bioindicators of soil pollution, in particular, due to their high sensitivity to changing environmental conditions and rapid response to contamination [12,37]. ...
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... Therefore, they could be suitable indices for the biomonitoring of the contaminated area (Dhiman and Pant 2021;Ugbaja et al. 2020;El-Gendy et al. 2021;Radwan et al. 2020). For instance, significant correlations between the glutathione content and acetylcholinesterase activity in C. aspersus and risk element contents in the soil were reported by Douafer et al. (2020). However, the sensitivity of the antioxidative enzyme activities in H. pomatia varies according to the snail tissues analyzed (Vrankovic et al. 2020). ...
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... The development of human activities is responsible for the chronic pollution of the environment by organic and inorganic contaminants (Larba & Soltani, 2014;Breitwieser et al., 2020;Douafer et al., 2020). The marine environment, and in particular coastal areas, receives a large amount of contaminants from urban, agricultural, port and industrial activities. ...
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... Changes in absorbance were recorded at 340 nm with a spectrophotometer "Agilent Technologies" type CARY 60 UV-Vis. AChE activity was assessed following the procedure of Ellman et al. (1961) described elsewhere (Douafer et al., 2020) with the use of acetylthiocholine (ASCh) as substrate Measurements were conducted at a wavelength of 412 nm with a run time of 20 minutes. The activity of GST and AChE was expressed as μM/mn/mg protein. ...
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The Solution Structure and Dynamics of Cd-Metallothionein from Helix pomatia Reveal Optimization for Binding Cd over Zn
Article
  • Oct 2019
Metallothioneins (MTs) are cysteine-rich polypeptides that are naturally found coordinated to either monovalent and/or divalent transition metal ions. Three metallothionein isoforms from the Roman snail, Helix pomatia, are known. They differ in their physiological metal load and in its specificity for transition metal ions such as Cd²⁺ (HpCdMT isoform), Cu⁺ (HpCuMT isoform), or without a defined metal specificity (HpCd/CuMT isoform). We have determined the solution structure of the Cd-specific isoform (HpCdMT) by nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) using recombinant isotopically labelled protein loaded with Zn²⁺ or Cd²⁺. Both structures display two-domain architectures, where each domain comprises a characteristic three-metal cluster similar to that observed in the β-domains of vertebrate MTs. The polypeptide backbone is well-structured over the entire sequence including the inter-domain linker. Interestingly, the two domains display mutual contacts, as observed before for the metallothionein of the snail Littorina littorea, to which both N and C-terminal domains have high similarity. Increasing the length of the linker motionally decouples both domains and removes mutual contacts between them without major influence on the stability of the individual domains. The structures of Cd6- and Zn6-HpCdMT are nearly identical. However, ¹⁵N relaxation, in particular ¹⁵N R2 rates, are accelerated for many residues of Zn6- HpCdMT but not for Cd6-HpCdMT, revealing the presence of conformational exchange effects. We suggest that this snail MT isoform is evolutionarily optimized for binding Cd rather than Zn.
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Bioaccumulation of cadmium in soil organisms - With focus on wood ash application
Article
  • Mar 2018
  • ECOTOX ENVIRON SAFE
Harvesting whole-tree biomass for biofuel combustion intensifies removal of nutrients from the ecosystem. This can be partly amended by applying ash from the combustion back to the system and thus recycle the nutrients. However, besides being rich in inorganic nutrients, ash also contains trace amounts of heavy metals. Due to the risk of toxic effects and trophic transfer of heavy metals, especially cadmium, legislation usually restricts the use of ash as a soil amendment. In order to provide researchers and governmental agencies with a tool to assess the risk of cadmium bioaccumulation in specific soil systems after ash application, we review: 1) the properties of ash; 2) the chemical and toxic properties of cadmium; 3) the key factors affecting cadmium bioavailability, cadmium uptake-, storage- and elimination-abilities in soil organisms and the risk of cadmium accumulation and biomagnification in the soil food web; 4) how ash impact on soil can change the risk of cadmium bioaccumulation. We conclude that for assessing the risk of cadmium bioaccumulation for specific sites, it is necessary to consider both the type and composition of ash, the soil conditions and organism composition on the site. On a general basis, we conclude that granulated ashes low in cadmium content, applied to low pH soils with high organic matter content, in systems with low abundances of earthworms, isopods and gastropods, will have a low risk of cadmium accumulation.
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