Artemia salina acute immobilization test: a possible tool for aquatic ecotoxicity assessment

Despite the fact that the marine crustacean Artemia salina is extensively used in ecotoxicology, there is still a lack of information about its sensitivity to commonly used chemicals. In the presented study, acute toxicity of 18 commonly used chemicals – including organic solvents, industrial chemicals, metals and inorganic compounds – to A. salina was evaluated. A. salina showed a range of sensitivities to tested chemicals. Regarding all of the investigated organics, phenolic compounds expressed the highest toxicity to A. salina. Nitrite and mercury were the most toxic inorganic substances applied in the study. On the other hand, dimethyl sulfoxide, nitrate and ammonium were the least toxic. The possibility to use A. salina for interspecies correlation was assessed by comparison of sensitivities of different organisms (bacteria, fish, crustacean) to organic compounds. Correlation between various species was observed, especially between A. salina and fish. Due to the strong relation between toxicity and the logarithm of the octanol/water partition coefficient logP_OW, lipophilicity was found to be the main factor influencing toxicity of the chosen organic compounds. No significant correlation between toxicity to A. salina and physico-chemical parameters of metals was observed.