Scientists find levels of mercury and
cadmium in the whales’ brains increased with age
Thursday 11 February 2016 16.52 GMTLast
modified on Thursday 11 February 201617.07 GMT
Scientists have found clear evidence that
whales are absorbing high levels of toxic heavy metals, with cadmium found in
the brains of pilot whales which washed up in Scotland.
Chemists at the University of Aberdeen
The research shows for the first time
that cadmium – known to pass into the brains of infant and unborn whales - had
also passed across the so-called blood-brain barrier in adult whales.
They said their findings also suggested that mercury concentrations could be increasing high enough in the seas “to lead to additional toxic stress in the long-lived marine mammals”, with higher concentrations increasing with age.
The team, lead by Dr Eva Krupp, an environmental analytical chemist, tested the remains of 21 long-finned pilot whales which died in a mass grounding between Anstruther and Pittenweem in Fife in September 2012.
There have been a series of recent whale strandings, with the most dramatic in theUK taking place in Norfolk East Anglia , in a stranding linked to other
recent groundings by sperm whales in Germany
and France
They said their findings also suggested that mercury concentrations could be increasing high enough in the seas “to lead to additional toxic stress in the long-lived marine mammals”, with higher concentrations increasing with age.
The team, lead by Dr Eva Krupp, an environmental analytical chemist, tested the remains of 21 long-finned pilot whales which died in a mass grounding between Anstruther and Pittenweem in Fife in September 2012.
There have been a series of recent whale strandings, with the most dramatic in the
“We were able to gather an unprecedented
number of tissue samples from all the major organs including the brain and as a
result we can see for the first time the long term effects of mammalian
exposure to the environmental pollutants,” Krupp said of the whales that
stranded in 2012.
“This pod of whales provides unique new
insights because we were able to look at the effects on a large number of
whales from the same pod and how this varied according to age.”
The university said that in three of the whales aged nine years or older, the mercury concentrations were higher than the toxic levels which would cause severe neurological damage in humans.
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