Pollution by trace elements (TEs) and plastics represents a significant threat to coastal ecosystems. Plastics, due to their low biodegradability, accumulate in the environment, while their chemical additives (PAs) can be absorbed by cells, affecting marine biota. Mixtures of contaminants can increase toxicity to organisms such as polychaetes, but the interaction between PAs and TEs is still poorly understood. Polychaetes, which are fundamental to biodiversity and food chains, live buried in sediments and are exposed to contaminants.
Thus, GEOPLASTTES aims to provide needed knowledge on the: 1) presence and distribution of PAs in Ria de Aveiro lagoon; 2) bioaccumulation of Pas in environmentally and economically important marine invertebrates, such as polychaetes; 3) PAs and TEs bioaccumulation, and the impact on organisms cell functioning; 4) potential for PAs to biomagnify along a marine trophic chain that includes polychaetes and to evaluate PAs influence on TEs biomagnification. All the information acquired will help predict the drivers conditioning PAs and TES geochemistry, the resilience of polychaetes populations and can be used to generate regulatory guidelines and management practices that can mitigate pollutants impacts, preserve polychaete populations and contribute to the sustainability of this biological resource (SDG 12,14).
