BIOLOGICAL AND RADIOECOLOGICAL STUDIES OF SOME BENTHIC ORGANISMS AND SEDIMENTS IN THE COASTAL ZONE ALONG THE BULGARIAN BLACK SEA COAST

E. Petrova, L. Misheva, S. Stoykov, I. Yordanova, D. Staneva

Abstract: The present paper includes the biological studies of the biodiversity of macrozoobenthos in the marine coastal area and radioecological studies for the presence of natural and anthropogenic radionuclides in some benthic organisms and sediments in the period 2010–2012. Macrozoobenthos samples were taken from the board of R/V „Prof. Al. Valkanov“ by “Van-Veen” grab with opening mouth 1/10 m2. The samples for radionuclides were analyzed by gamma-spectrometry with a multichannel analyzer DSA 1000 with Ge-detector. It was determinate the specific activity of the following radionuclides: the technogenic Cesium-137, the natural Thorium-134, Uranium-235, Radium-226, Actinium-228 and Potassium-40. It was made analysis and evaluation of the results. The biodiversity of benthic organisms is an indicator of the water pollution state and the radioecological cleanliness is utmost importance, due to the use of some zoobenthos organisms for food.

Keywords: benthic organisms; biological and radioecological studies; Black Sea; sediments

Date published: 2017-09-28