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COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations

We examined 10 subsurface water, 5 benthic water and 19 sediment (02 cm) samples along a 518 km of the middle segment of the Ganga River to assess the possible improvements that resulted from the industrial shutdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. The sites included the main stem river, tributary conf...

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Autores principales: Singh, Madhulika, Pandey, Jitendra
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer International Publishing 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9546754/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36208349
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10661-022-10507-9
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author Singh, Madhulika
Pandey, Jitendra
author_facet Singh, Madhulika
Pandey, Jitendra
author_sort Singh, Madhulika
collection PubMed
description We examined 10 subsurface water, 5 benthic water and 19 sediment (02 cm) samples along a 518 km of the middle segment of the Ganga River to assess the possible improvements that resulted from the industrial shutdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. The sites included the main stem river, tributary confluences, and two point sources, one of which releases metal-rich effluents and the other flushes municipal sewage. We found significant declines in the carbon, nutrient and metal concentrations in both the water and sediment. Even the most polluted zones did not show hypoxia (dissolve oxygen; DO < 2.0 mg L(−1)) that had been observed in the previous year. Despite a significant decline in carbon and nitrogen as substrates, the activities of extracellular enzymes (EEs), such as β-D-glucosidase, FDAase and protease in sediment (0–2 cm depth), increased significantly (p < 0.05) in response to the declining metal concentrations resulting from the industrial shutdown. We found strong negative correlations between EE activity and the concentrations of metal pollutants measured in 2019, but the correlations between these variables appeared poor in 2020 (lockdown period). Also, we found large variances (low stability coefficients) during the period of strong anthropogenic effects (2019). The study indicates that industrial sources are important contributors of metal pollution in the Ganga River and has relevance exploring river ecosystem recovery windows for management decisions.
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spelling pubmed-95467542022-10-11 COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations Singh, Madhulika Pandey, Jitendra Environ Monit Assess Article We examined 10 subsurface water, 5 benthic water and 19 sediment (02 cm) samples along a 518 km of the middle segment of the Ganga River to assess the possible improvements that resulted from the industrial shutdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. The sites included the main stem river, tributary confluences, and two point sources, one of which releases metal-rich effluents and the other flushes municipal sewage. We found significant declines in the carbon, nutrient and metal concentrations in both the water and sediment. Even the most polluted zones did not show hypoxia (dissolve oxygen; DO < 2.0 mg L(−1)) that had been observed in the previous year. Despite a significant decline in carbon and nitrogen as substrates, the activities of extracellular enzymes (EEs), such as β-D-glucosidase, FDAase and protease in sediment (0–2 cm depth), increased significantly (p < 0.05) in response to the declining metal concentrations resulting from the industrial shutdown. We found strong negative correlations between EE activity and the concentrations of metal pollutants measured in 2019, but the correlations between these variables appeared poor in 2020 (lockdown period). Also, we found large variances (low stability coefficients) during the period of strong anthropogenic effects (2019). The study indicates that industrial sources are important contributors of metal pollution in the Ganga River and has relevance exploring river ecosystem recovery windows for management decisions. Springer International Publishing 2022-10-08 2022 /pmc/articles/PMC9546754/ /pubmed/36208349 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10661-022-10507-9 Text en © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022, Springer Nature or its licensor holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law. This article is made available via the PMC Open Access Subset for unrestricted research re-use and secondary analysis in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for the duration of the World Health Organization (WHO) declaration of COVID-19 as a global pandemic.
spellingShingle Article
Singh, Madhulika
Pandey, Jitendra
COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations
title COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations
title_full COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations
title_fullStr COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations
title_full_unstemmed COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations
title_short COVID-19 lockdown–driven changes in the Ganga River ecosystem in response to human perturbations
title_sort covid-19 lockdown–driven changes in the ganga river ecosystem in response to human perturbations
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9546754/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36208349
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10661-022-10507-9
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