Aquatic and Terrestrial Plant Ecology, Ecotoxicology and Risk Assessment: Session Summary From SETAC Vienna
Guido Gonsior, GG Biotech Design; Valeska Contardo, UBA; Rena Isemer, Bayer AG; and Joshua Arnie, Eurofins US
The session “Aquatic and terrestrial plant ecology, ecotoxicology and risk assessment“ at the SETAC Europe 35th Annual Meeting in Vienna, Austria, was sponsored by the SETAC Plants Interest Group.
Plants, as primary producers, play a key role in linking food webs and biogeochemical cycles. Cutting-edge innovations in ecology and ecotoxicology science allow us to predict how plants will respond to current and future challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, or increased agricultural land use. Safe and sustainable concepts can be identified through calculation of environmental risks based on advanced methods and fair data to protect the food chain, biodiversity, and terrestrial and coastal ecosystems. The session focused on promoting innovative concepts and methods to further discussion in the fields of aquatic and terrestrial plant ecology and ecotoxicology. Contributions to the session spanned many trophic levels – from microalgae to macrophytes and higher plants – with presentations highlighting potential impacts to single species as well as microbiome and plant communities.
The SETAC Plants Interest Group sponsored session featured 24 platform and poster presentations, representing research from academia, government and business. The platform session was well attended, with engaging discussions during the questions period following presentations.
Platform Presentations
The first presentation discussed the impact of chemical and environmental stressors on periphyton microbial activity and photosynthetic yield. In the aquatic plants research area, represented by the second and third platform presentation, effects on macrophyte community composition and recovery from herbicide exposure was presented. Investigations into a potential alternative herbicide exposure scenario on floating aquatic macrophytes (Lemna gibba G3) was presented. This presentation highlighted research into direct overspray of this important macrophyte species commonly used in risk assessment. The final two presentations were focused on terrestrial plant research and risk assessment. One presentation provided a framework illustrating the challenges in estimating potential effect concentrations based on visual injury. The final presentation provided insights into drift capture efficiency of terrestrial plants.
Poster Highlights
The poster session featured 19 posters, with 11 contributions related to aquatic macrophyte testing, 4 contributions on single cell primary producers, and 4 contributions involving terrestrial plant testing. Contributions included but were not limited to biostimulant efficacy in plant development in historically contaminated soils; effects of contaminants (pharmaceutical, agricultural chemicals and cosmetics) and environmental stressors on algae, macrophytes and terrestrial plants; utilization of plants and plant products for phytoremediation efforts; species sensitivity distribution modeling for aquatic macrophytes; differences in adverse effects from conventional exposure relative to overspray for aquatic macrophytes; assessment of non-destructive macrophyte endpoints; assessment of phytotoxicity in aquatic plants; and developments in creating a test protocol to assess reproduction endpoints in terrestrial plants.
Open Meeting
The participation and lively discussions during the platform and poster sessions emphasizes importance of plants for ecosystem research. The SETAC Plants Interest Group hosted an informative open meeting in a packed room. Rena Isemer, Bayer AG and European co-chair for the Interest Group, invited participants to join the group, a highly active scientific community. She especially encouraged interested individuals to consider becoming a member of the Steering Committee, which has been taking an active role in fostering plant research among SETAC members. Isemer also indicated that the steering committee is seeking student members, which would benefit prospective student contributors through opportunities to collaborate with other scientists and advance their knowledge of plant ecology, ecotoxicology and risk assessment, while also supporting the continued success of the steering committee.
The Open Meeting lead off with updates of the activities of five working groups; assessment and implementation of an overspray exposure design for macrophyte testing (Sabine Duquesne, UBA), updates on a ring-test to evaluate a potential flow-through design to assess algal toxicity (Eric Bruns, Bayer), evaluation of visual injury in aquatic and terrestrial plants as an endpoint for risk assessments (Guido Gonsior, GG Biotech Design, and Joshua Arnie, Eurofins), and development of a protocol by the terrestrial plant reproduction testing working group (Andreas Duffner, Eurofins). The goal of these groups is to provide new methods to strengthen the scientific basis for risk assessments. These presentations were followed by a Q&A period and open discussion round.
Please visit the SETAC Plants Interest Group website for more information. We always welcome new members.
Contact: [email protected]