Ecotoxicity database

ECOTOX database (excerpt from search, October 21, 2002) (hllp //u ii u, epa.goy/... 

Eastman Chemical Co., 227 Eastman Kodak Company, 227 ECHO , chlorothalonil, 60 ECOTOX Database System, 305 ECOTRIN , asphm, 60... 

The Ecotox database provides single chemical toxicity information for aquatic and terrestial life. This is a useful tool for evaluating the impact of chemicals on the environment. 

The evaluation for aquatic toxicity on daphnids and fish is reported in Tables 12 and 13. Bold values indicate that compounds are out of the model applicability domain (ECOSAR) or that the prediction is not reliable. ECOSAR and ToxSuite are able to predict all the selected compounds while T.E.S.T. fails in prediction for the daphnia toxicity of perfluorinated compounds (PFOS and PFOA). Tables 12 and 13 include also a limited number of experimental results provided by the model training dataset (some data are extracted from USEPA Ecotox database). Predicted results are in agreement for five compounds only (2, 3, 5, 13 and 14) for both endpoints while the predictions for the other compounds are highly variable. 

Increasingly over recent years, data covering a wider range of species and data from nonstandard test species and systems have been published in the scientific literature. Much of these data can be found on publically available databases such as the US EPA s ECOTOX database (http //www.epa.gov/ecotox/) and a comprehensive evaluation has recently been conducted by Giddings (Giddings... 

Tier 2 PRA process involved developing environmental exposure data and chronic toxicity data distributions for individual POPs. The mean concentrations of POPs in local marine water measured at various locations were used as exposure data in the construction of the exposure distribution. The chronic toxicity data distribution was established based on published international acute toxicity data (LC50, EC50) on a variety of aquatic organisms tested in many jurisdictions, drawn primarily from the USEPA ECOTOX database (2002) (available at http //www.epa.gov/ ecotox). If the upper 5th centile of the measured chemical exposure data distribution did not exceed the lower 5th centile of its estimated chronic toxicity distribution, the potential ecological risk posed by the chemical was judged to be tolerable (Hall and Giddings, 2000). 

As an example, 2,4-dichlorophenol (2,4-DCP) is an acidic compound with a pA"a of 7.68 and a K0Wni of 3.06 (Mackay et al. 1997). Consultation of the USEPA Ecotox database reveals a chronic reproduction toxicity NOEC value for Daphnia... 

The proposed protocol is a logical extension of the evaluation scheme provided by Plackett and Hewlett (1952) for the problem of predicting effects of complex mixtures of known composition. However, there are as yet only few data available to verify its predictive capacity (Altenburger et al. 2005). Also, ecotoxicity databases usually do not contain the full concentration effect data, which means that reevaluation of existing studies will be laborious. 

Formerly known as Aquatic Information and Retrieval (AQUIRE) (Hunter et al., 1990), the ECOTOX database is one of the earliest free sources of toxicological and, to an extent, physicochemical data on the Internet. It is made available from the EPA and has undergone several modifications. Originally only accessible to U.S. government personnel and contractors, it was... 

The toxic pressure of each of the compounds in a mixture is calculated using the species sensitivity distribution (SSD) concept. In this concept, laboratory toxicity data for various species are collected from a database, for example, the USEPA s Ecotox database (USEPA 2005) or the RIVM e-toxBase (Wintersen et al. 2004), and compiled for each compound. A statistical distribution of these data, called the SSD, is derived. Each SSD describes the relationship between exposure concentration (X) and toxic pressure (Y), whereby the latter is expressed as the probably affected fraction (PAF, %) per compound (Posthuma et al. 2002). Depending on the test endpoint chosen for deriving SSDs, there is the option to derive chronic and acute toxic pressures, based on SSDN0ECs and SSDEC50s, respectively. 

USEPA] US Environmental Protection Agency. 2005. ECOTOX database. US Environmental Protection Agency. Available from http //cfpub.epa.gov/ecotox/... 

The US EPA ECOTOX database reports that Cer-iodaphnia and Daphnia species are the most sensitive freshwater organisms following acute (48 h) exposure to benzene, with respective EC50 values of 130 and 400 ppb. Most organisms, however, can tolerate acute concentrations higher than this (in the 1-10mgl ... 

The US Environmental Protection Agency ECOTOX database has very few records for decane. An acute (48-96 h) no-observed-effect concentration of 500 mgl was recorded for the sheepshead minnow (saltwater fish). Acute effects (48 h exposure) on the water flea (Daphnia magna LC50) ranged from 1.3 to 29mgl (freshwater cladocercan). 

No records are available in the US Environmental Protection Agency ECOTOX database for glyceraldehyde. Because this chemical is a metabolic intermediate and could easily be utilized by microorganisms, a release or spill of this compound into the general environment would not be expected to have any long-term adverse effects as the half-life in soil or water would be expected to be very brief (days). 

There are no data in the US Environmental Protection Agency s ECOTOX database on propane. This is probably because highly volatile compounds such as propane, which exist as gases at normal environmental temperatures (e.g., >0°C), would be expected to... 

There is very little environmental effects data on sodium sulfite. Water fleas (Daphnia sp.) exposed to sodium sulfite for 24 8 h have an LC50 between 200 and 300 mg 1 (US Environmental Protection Agency ECOTOX database). The pEI of the solution, however, can strongly affect how much of the compound is ionized and thus greatly affect the toxicity. 

USEPA (2008) ECOTOX Database, http //www.epa.gov/ecotox/. Accessed 17 Jan 2008... 

Measures of effect may be obtained from published studies on the ecological entity of concern. Effects may also be estimated by extrapolating from studies of other receptors that are subject to comparable exposure scenarios. When the stressors are chemicals, the EPA s online ECOTOX database provides a comprehensive source of information on the effects of thousands of toxic chemicals on hundreds of species of animals and plants. Data gaps may be filled by performing field or laboratory studies as part of the ecological risk assessment. 

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