Critical biotransformation half-lives of chemicals in air-breathing wildlife to assess food-chain bioaccumulation and biomagnification

Abstract

Biomagnification, the process by which chemical concentrations increase in organisms at higher trophic levels, can pose significant risks to wildlife and ecosystems. Despite its importance, our understanding of species-specific differences in biomagnification potential remains limited. The analysis of the critical biotransformation half-life, the maximum half-life to avoid biomagnification of a chemical, can help address this gap. Here, I present a comprehensive analysis of critical biotransformation half-lives across diverse air-breathing wildlife species, providing novel insights into the factors influencing biomagnification. By constructing species-specific contour plots in chemical partition space, I reveal substantial variations in biomagnification potential among different organisms, with differences in critical biotransformation half-lives reaching more than two orders of magnitude. These substantial interspecies differences underscore the need for species-specific biotransformation data and biomagnification modelling. This analysis also demonstrates that model normalisation methods significantly impact these species-specific differences, suggesting that the choice of normalisation can alter biomagnification assessments. I further delineate the chemical partition space regions where elimination is dominated by urination versus respiration, highlighting important interspecies variations. Finally, I introduce a weight-of-evidence approach for assessing potential food-chain biomagnification, illustrated through a case study on methoxychlor, which is a generalizable approach that differs from current approaches by its stronger focus on biotransformation. A critical discussion of allometric scaling and sources of uncertainty identifies further research needs. This work enhances our ability to predict and assess biomagnification risks across diverse ecosystems and species, offering valuable tools for environmental risk assessment and conservation efforts.