Microcystin as a Biogeochemical Cycle:  pools, fluxes, and fates of the cyanotoxin in aquatic ecosystems

This is a Preprint and has not been peer reviewed. The published version of this Preprint is available: https://doi.org/10.1002/lol2.10300. This is version 2 of this Preprint.

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Authors

Quin Shingai, Grace Marie Wilkinson 

Abstract

Microcystin poses a serious threat to aquatic ecosystems and human health. There is a pressing need to understand the production, movement, and storage of microcystin in lakes. We constructed a conceptual biogeochemical model for microcystin through a comprehensive literature synthesis, identifying four major pools and nine major fluxes in lakes that also connect to the terrestrial environment. This conceptual model can be used as the framework for developing ecosystem mass balances of microcystin. We propose that the concentration of microcystin in the water column is the balance between the import, sediment translocation, production and degradation, uptake, burial, and export. However, substantial unknowns remain pertaining to the magnitude and movement of microcystin. Future investigations should focus on sediment fluxes, drivers of biodegradation, and seasonal dynamics. Adopting the framework of a “microcystin cycle” improves our understanding of processes driving toxin prevalence and helps to prioritize strategies for minimizing exposure risks.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.31223/X5M937

Subjects

Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology

Keywords

microcystin, cyanotoxins, cyanobacteria

Dates

Published: 2022-06-17 04:34

Last Updated: 2023-05-09 21:11

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License

CC BY Attribution 4.0 International

Additional Metadata

Conflict of interest statement:
None

Data Availability (Reason not available):
This is a literature synthesis is from previously published data by other authors. The collated values from the literature and proper citation are in the Supplementary Information. The code and tabulated values for figure generation can be found at https://github.com/goodgracious23/microcystin_cycle and will be archived at Zenodo upon acceptance of the manuscript.