Acute Toxicity of Some Industrial Chemicals

Industrial chemicals represent the most important source of soil contamination. Especially dangerous from the point of view of groundwater and food chain contamination are the persistent chemicals such as chlorinated or aromatic compounds. The determination of the level of acute toxicity of these compounds by bacterial bioluminescence test using bioluminescence bacteria Photobacterium phosphoreum is one of the most suitable and most rapid ways of their environmental risk assessment (Bulich, 1982). The method can be used for the monitoring of soil contamination by toxic hazardous materials as well as for quick quantitative assessment of the acute toxicity of xenobiotics in concentration of mg/1 (ppm) in surface-water and groundwater, landfills and waste leachates and sewages (Carlson-Ekvall and Morrison, 1995).