Input of organic matter in Brunei Bay, East Malaysia, as indicated by sedimentary steroids and multivariate statistics

Swee Yun Pang; Joo Hui Tay; Suhaimi Suratman; Bernd R T Simoneit; Norhayati Mohd Tahir

doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2020.111269

Input of organic matter in Brunei Bay, East Malaysia, as indicated by sedimentary steroids and multivariate statistics

Mar Pollut Bull. 2020 Jul:156:111269. doi: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2020.111269. Epub 2020 May 16.

Authors

Swee Yun Pang¹, Joo Hui Tay², Suhaimi Suratman³, Bernd R T Simoneit⁴, Norhayati Mohd Tahir⁵

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Oceanography and Environment, Universiti Malaysia Terengganu, 21030 Kuala Nerus, Terengganu, Malaysia. Electronic address: p.sweeyun@gmail.com.
² Faculty of Industrial Sciences and Technology, Universiti Malaysia Pahang, Lebuhraya Tun Razak, 26300 Gambang, Malaysia.
³ Institute of Oceanography and Environment, Universiti Malaysia Terengganu, 21030 Kuala Nerus, Terengganu, Malaysia.
⁴ Department of Chemistry, College of Science, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA.
⁵ Institute of Oceanography and Environment, Universiti Malaysia Terengganu, 21030 Kuala Nerus, Terengganu, Malaysia; Faculty of Science and Marine Environment, Universiti Malaysia Terengganu, 21030 Kuala Nerus, Terengganu, Malaysia. Electronic address: hayati@umt.edu.my.

PMID: 32510409
DOI: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2020.111269

Abstract

Brunei Bay is one of the most important marine environments of East Malaysia (South China Sea), covering many productive ecosystems with activities including fisheries, tourism, and main shipping lanes for petroleum transfers. Evaluation of the sources and distributions of steroids in the surface sedimentary organic matter was carried out by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The concentrations of the total identified sterols (TIS) ranged between 0.81 and 12.69 μg g^-1 dry weight, and the total sterones were between 0.11 and 5.66 μg g^-1 dry weight. The coprostanol level was comparatively low (<0.10 μg g^-1), and the multi-biomarker proxies indicated that the region did not exhibit significant contamination from sewage effluents. Principal component analysis (PCA) revealed the coastal environment of the study area was dominated by allochthonous (mainly terrestrial) organic matter input.

Keywords: Allochthonous input; Brunei Bay; Coprostanol; PCA; Sterols.

MeSH terms

Bays
Brunei
China
Ecosystem
Environmental Monitoring
Geologic Sediments*
Malaysia
Water Pollutants, Chemical / analysis*

Substances

Water Pollutants, Chemical