Estimation of environmental partitioning of organic chemicals in model ecosystems

1983 ◽  
pp. 231-244 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. J. McCall ◽  
D. A. Laskowski ◽  
R. L. Swann ◽  
H. J. Dishburger
1997 ◽  
Vol 161 ◽  
pp. 197-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Duncan Steel

AbstractWhilst lithopanspermia depends upon massive impacts occurring at a speed above some limit, the intact delivery of organic chemicals or other volatiles to a planet requires the impact speed to be below some other limit such that a significant fraction of that material escapes destruction. Thus the two opposite ends of the impact speed distributions are the regions of interest in the bioastronomical context, whereas much modelling work on impacts delivers, or makes use of, only the mean speed. Here the probability distributions of impact speeds upon Mars are calculated for (i) the orbital distribution of known asteroids; and (ii) the expected distribution of near-parabolic cometary orbits. It is found that cometary impacts are far more likely to eject rocks from Mars (over 99 percent of the cometary impacts are at speeds above 20 km/sec, but at most 5 percent of the asteroidal impacts); paradoxically, the objects impacting at speeds low enough to make organic/volatile survival possible (the asteroids) are those which are depleted in such species.


1989 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 147-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. W. Hawker ◽  
D. W. Connell

The influence of some important biological and physicochemical factors on the bioconcentration of hydrophobic organic chemicals is outlined. For non-ionizable, persistent compounds the bioconcentration factor can be related to a compound's octanol/water partition coefficient, aqueous solubility and molecular weight, while the lipid content of an organism also affects the bioconcentration potential of these compounds. The effect of ionization and biodegradation of organic chemicals on bioconcentration is also discussed.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document