- Biogeochemistry of pollutants-- the study of the elements of 

 balance, processes of biologic concentration and transport through the 

 food chain, biogenic migration and transformation of artificial 

 substances in marine communities and ecosystems; 



- Ecologic toxicology--the study of the effects of toxic factors on 

 the hydrobionts and communities, estimation of the biologic and ecologic 

 consequences of the pollution of the marine environment, regulation of 

 permissible norms for the content of toxic substances. 



The level of development of the basic principles and methodology of 

 studies in each of these three areas differs significantly. Studies of 

 situations of pollution of individual marine regions are most 

 advanced. This has been facilitated by the successes achieved in 

 processing large volumes of information and the progress in the area of 

 analytic methods of detection and recording of trace quantities of man- 

 made substances in natural environments and substrates. The 

 methodologic principles of large-scale monitoring are being intensively 

 developed in our country and abroad, and also by means of international 

 cooperation (Goldberg, 1970; Marine Environmental Quality, 1971). 



The situation is quite different in the area of marine 

 biogeochemistry of toxicants and ecologic toxicology. In spite of the 

 abundance of the works dedicated to various aspects of the interaction 

 of marine organisms and communities with toxic man-made components of 

 the environment, the general methodology of studies of this nature, the 

 foundation of areas for study and summarization of the available 

 materials are essentially in the earliest stages of development. This 

 is particularly true of marine ecotoxicology--a new area of ecologic 

 investigation at the junction of marine biology, toxicology and 

 experimental ecology. 



It should be noted that marine ecotoxicology and the 

 biogeochemistry of pollutants mutually supplement each other, studying 

 two aspects of a single process of interaction between marine organisms 

 and the anthropogenically altered toxic environment. The situation is 

 somewhat similar in the area of study of radioecologic phenomena in the 

 ocean (Polikarpov, 1964). 



In terms of methodology, it is important to emphasize that 

 ecologic-toxicologic studies should be directed toward the study of 

 anomalies in marine communities and ecosystems under conditions as close 

 to natural conditions as possible. Studies performed directly in 

 polluted regions are ideal from this standpoint (Bechtel, Copeland, 

 1970; Bellan, Bellan-Santini , 1972; Mironov, 1972; Nelson-Smith, 1973); 

 however, they are possible only in cases of actual severe pollution, 

 when the biologic effects are obvious and can be directly quantitatively 

 measured. It is much more difficult to evaluate the actual or 

 potentially possible results under conditions of low levels of chemical 

 pollution. In these situations, the methods of experimental ecology, 

 toxicology of representative species and communities of marine 

 organisms, estimation of their production in situ in the presence of 

 toxicants, experimental modelling of food chains and ecosystems, and a 



407 



