Assessing the harm caused by pollutants in urban ecosystems remains a significant challenge. Traditional ecotoxicological endpoints are often not sensitive enough to detect the effects of toxicants at environmentally relevant concentrations (≤ng/L). A potential solution is using molecular biology methods to look at small biochemical changes caused by exposure to ng/L concentrations of contaminants. This has been tested in the lab but not conclusively demonstrated in the field. We exposed the freshwater amphipod () to water from an urban wetland containing known concentrations of per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances (as well as very low concentrations of pesticides) for 14 days and analyzed their metabolite profiles. Mannose, Myo-inositol, and Isopropyl propionate were found to change in PFAS exposed amphipods, a similar response to that previously observed in laboratory exposures to the same PFAS, but not pesticides. The results give a better understanding of PFAS toxicity at environmentally relevant concentrations and conditions.

中文翻译：

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淡水片脚类 Austrochiltonia subtenuis 接触 PFAS 污染的城市湿地水会导致与实验室接触类似的代谢变化


评估城市生态系统污染物造成的危害仍然是一项重大挑战。传统的生态毒理学终点通常不够灵敏，无法检测环境相关浓度（≤ng/L）的毒物的影响。一个潜在的解决方案是使用分子生物学方法来观察因暴露于 ng/L 浓度的污染物而引起的微小生化变化。这已经在实验室进行了测试，但尚未在现场得到最终证明。我们将淡水片足类动物 () 暴露在来自城市湿地的水中 14 天，其中含有已知浓度的全氟烷基物质和多氟烷基物质（以及浓度非常低的农药），并分析了它们的代谢谱。研究发现，甘露糖、肌醇和丙酸异丙酯在暴露于 PFAS 的片足类动物中发生了变化，这与之前在实验室暴露于相同 PFAS（但不是农药）时观察到的反应类似。这些结果有助于更好地了解 PFAS 在环境相关浓度和条件下的毒性。