Assessing Methylmercury Biomagnification in the Delaware Bay Food Web

• Sophia Vrh, Biological Sciences, University of Delaware

• Mi-Ling Li, Earth Sciences, Water Sciences, and Policy (School of Marine Science and Policy), University of Delaware

Methylmercury (MeHg) is a chemical toxicant known to biomagnify along aquatic food chains; however, the extent of MeHg biomagnification across global coastal ecosystems varies by location. To further our understanding of MeHg biomagnification in coastal environments that contain complex food web structures, we sampled 26 fish and shellfish species as well as size-fractioned plankton from the Delaware Bay. The organisms in this study were measured for their length and analyzed for their mercury concentration and carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios. With these data, we investigated the importance of environmental and biological factors, such as fish length, trophic level, and habitat type, for explaining the pattern of MeHg biomagnification in the Delaware Bay. Results from this study are important for understanding how MeHg spreads throughout the Delaware Bay ecosystem, adding to the global body of knowledge on the biomagnification of this toxicant.