Regional assessment of sewage contamination in sediments of the Iguaçu and the Barigui Rivers (Curitiba city, Paraná, southern Brazil) using fecal steroids

Abstract

Esteroides derivados de fontes fecal (coprostanol, epicoprostanol e coprostanona) e mista (colesterol, colestanol e colestanona) foram analisados em 19 amostras de sedimentos superficiais, coletados em duas amostragens, por cromatografia gasosa com detector de ionização de chama (GC/FID) para prover uma avaliação regional da contaminação por esgotos nos Rios Iguaçu e Barigui, no Sul do Brasil. As concentrações médias de coprostanol na coleta de verão (109 ± 122 µg g , caracterizam os sedimentos como altamente contaminados por material fecal. Razões diagnósticas usando compostos selecionados sugeriram que os efluentes domésticos são a principal fonte de contaminação, embora o esterco produzido em áreas rurais possa ter importância localizada. Os resultados mostraram que o lançamento de esgotos não tratados pode representar um risco para a saúde ambiental do sistema fluvial quando a capacidade do sistema para dispersar e diluir efluentes é reduzida em períodos de baixo fluxo de água.Steroids derived from fecal (coprostanol, epicoprostanol and coprostanone) and mixed (cholesterol, cholestanol and cholestanone) sources were analyzed in 19 surface sediments collected in two samplings by gas chromatography with flame ionization detection (GC/FID) in order to provide a regional assessment of the sewage contamination in the Iguaçu and Barigui Rivers, Southern Brazil. The mean concentrations of coprostanol in the Summer (109 ± 122 mg g -1 ) and Winter (130 ± 116 µg g -1 ) seasons in 2007, with maximum value of approximately 330 mg g -1 , situate the studied sediments as heavily contaminated by sewage. Diagnostic ratios among selected compounds suggested that domestic effluents were the main source of contamination, although the contribution of manure from livestock might also be locally important. The results show that the release of raw sewage may pose a relevant threat to the environmental health of river systems when the capacity to disperse and dilute the effluents is reduced during periods of small river water flow.

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“…Quando presente na água de rios, a cafeína costuma estar associada a outras substâncias que também possuem atividades citotóxicas e genotóxicas, como, por exemplo, anti-inflamatórios e bisfenol A (FROEHNER et al, 2011;PUERARI et al, 2012;EDWARDS et al, 2015;EKKLESIA et al, 2015;KUZMA-NOVIC et al, 2015;PHILLIPS et al, 2015;SENTA et al, 2015;THOMAIDI et al, 2015).…”

Quantification of Sterol and Triterpenol Biomarkers in Sediments of the Cananéia-Iguape Estuarine-Lagoonal System (Brazil) by UHPLC-MS/MS

“…Sterols have been used to assess the OM origin in several estuarine systems around the world because of their recalcitrance and specific-source, which allows classifying the OM input from different sources, including terrestrial plants [ 3 ], phytoplankton [ 4 ], bacteria [ 5 ], and heterotrophic eukaryote and benthic algae [ 6 ]. Furthermore, besides natural OM sources, sterols have been applied in environmental studies to track human activities in coastal areas [ 7 , 8 ].…”

Investigation of sewage contamination using steroid indexes in sediments of the Guajará Estuary (Amazon coast, Brazil)

“…SHAH et al (2007) estimated that chickens, which may be taken to provide a rough comparison as such birds do not feed exclusively on animals detritus, contribute substantially to the cholesterol and sitosterol of the total fecal steroids (with, respectively, 20 and 60%). An attempt to characterize fecal contamination in riverine systems from different sources has been presented by PUERARI et al (2012) based on ternary plots using data from and distinguishing contributions from pigs, horses and cows. To the best of our knowledge, there are no data regarding the fecal steroid composition of vultures and herons that could provide a more detailed assessment of these sources in Ver-o-Peso and Porto da Palha.…”