Abstract

Estuaries and coastal lagoons are complex ecosystems that are home for their unique characteristics to a large number of organisms of commercial and ecological importance and their location, serve as urban settlements, ports and industrial systems that use these areas as dumping water waste, mainly in the Gulf of Mexico oil industry. To assess contamination in an aquatic ecosystem, it is necessary to resort to certain bodies of their habitat and location in the food chain, serve as indicators, they also must have certain characteristics: to present a wide geographical distribution, being sedentary, sessile and have preferably economic importance, so the shellfish are considered monitors of change caused by environmental pollution, within this group, bivalves are regarded as the best biomarkers, not only for their lifestyle and food habits, but also as a source of important food, this is the situation of oysters (Crassostrea virginica, C. gigas, and C. corteziensis), mussels (Mytilus edulis and M. californianus) and clams (Mya arenaria). Toxicity studies are more significant when carried out on important species in fisheries. The accumulation of heavy metals in oysters, C. virginica, from lagoon system along the gulf coast of Mexico, results from inputs provided by anthropogenic activities and the physicochemical and ecophysiological processes ocurring in these systems. The objective of this study was to determine concentrations of Cd, Pb, and Zn in C. virginica from Carmen Lagoon, Tabasco. Three sampling sites were selected, and each sample consisted of 50 oysters of commercial size. Concentrations of Cd, Pb, and Zn were determined using atomic absorption spectrophotometry.

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