The Effect of Municipal Wastewater Effluent on the Stress Response of Native Fish Species in the Bow River, Calgary, Alberta
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Municipal wastewater effluent (MWWE) is a point-source of contamination to surface waters, and contains a mixture of nutrients and pharmaceuticals that are not completely eliminated during wastewater treatment processes. There have been many studies using reproductive endpoints to examine sub-lethal effects on fish sampled downstream from MWWE sources; however, few studies have examined effects on the stress performance of fish in the field, particularly in wild populations residing downstream from MWWE sources. The overall objective of this thesis was to determine whether exposure to MWWE in the field compromised the stress performance of native fish species in the Bow River, Calgary, Alberta. The hypothesis was that long-term exposure to MWWE would result in chronic stress and disruption of the hypothalamus-pituitary-interrenal (HPI) axis, leading to a reduced ability to respond to a secondary acute stressor and decreased energy stores due to enhanced energy demands. The results show that feral longnose dace (Rhinichthys cataractae; Chapter 2) and caged fathead minnows (Pimephales promelas; Chapter 3) sampled downstream from municipal wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) in the Bow River, Calgary, Alberta, did not have elevated basal cortisol levels and were able to mount a cortisol response following exposure to an additional acute stressor. This suggests that there was no disruption in the HPI axis functioning. Furthermore, the energy stores in fish downstream from WWTPs were greater, which could be due to increased feeding, as fish were also greater in size. The effects detected on energy metabolism cannot be fully attributed to MWWE, as fish sampled from an upstream site also showed similar levels of glycogen stores as fish sampled from sites downstream from WWTPs. This suggests that stormwater and urban runoff may contribute to effects on the metabolism of fish.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".