BIOLOGICAL METHOD FOR DETERMINING DEGREE OF TOTAL TOXICITY AND PRINCIPAL TOXICANTS IN AQUEOUS MEDIA (VERSIONS) Russian patent published in 1998 - IPC

FIELD: environmental monitoring. SUBSTANCE: method can be utilized in environmental protection service and when monitoring aqueous media with biotesting technique, in particular, when estimating toxicity of water, soils, and bottom sediments polluted by various substances, their contents exceeding maximum permissible concentrations with wide range of exceeding ratios. As test organisms, laboratory culture species are single-time utilized grown by way of closely-related crossing of aquatic organisms under constant maintenance conditions on artificial pure standard water and feed. Detected and compared to each other are behavior reaction spectra of test organisms and their locomotion activity occurring in a series of model toxicant solutions in pure standard water and test aqueous medium. In the other embodiment of method, additionally determined is percentage of test organisms able to find feed within specified period of time. From the comparison data, principal toxicants and their concentrations in test medium are established, and toxicity degree of medium is determined by way of comparing specified concentrations of toxicants with maximum permissible concentration rates for test medium. EFFECT: extended toxicant testing possibilities. 2 cl, 14 tbl