Squids and octopods beware: Contaminants now in your world (CNN)

[eppur_se_muova]

Fire retardants in deep sea squids?

Marine scientists now have evidence that a whole range of chemical contaminants have found their way to the deepest and most remote parts of the ocean.

“Most people think the deep sea is so far away that humans don’t affect it,” said Michael Vecchione, a cephalopod biologist at NOAA Fisheries’ National Systematics Laboratory.

Cephalopods include octopods, squids, cuttlefishes and nautiluses. The toxic chemicals that Vecchione and colleagues from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science found are a rogues gallery of scary initials: PCBs, TBTs, BDEs, and DDT* among them. Scientists classify all of them as POPs, or persistent organic pollutants. It means they don’t break down, and stay in the environment… pretty much forever.

It’s not yet clear what level of these chemicals could harm or kill these deep sea creatures.
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more: http://scitech.blogs.cnn.com/

[PetrusMonsFormicarum]

1. Cthulhu

Cthulhu isn't gonna like it . . .

[eppur_se_muova]

2. The Nixon pose seems a real natural. nt

[RoseMead]

3. What a relief!

I no longer have to worry about squids bursting into flame! Hooray!