Contamination of sea urchin Mesocentrotus nudus by radiocesium released during the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident

Mst Nazira Akhter Rithu; Akira Matsumoto; Naoto Hirakawa; Yukari Ito; Hisayuki Arakawa

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0269947

Contamination of sea urchin Mesocentrotus nudus by radiocesium released during the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident

PLoS One. 2022 Aug 15;17(8):e0269947. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0269947. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Mst Nazira Akhter Rithu¹, Akira Matsumoto², Naoto Hirakawa³, Yukari Ito¹, Hisayuki Arakawa¹

Affiliations

¹ Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, Minato, Tokyo, Japan.
² Soma Branch, Fishery Office of the Fukushima Prefectural Government, Fukushima, Japan.
³ Fukushima Prefectural Research Institute of Fisheries Resources, Fukushima, Japan.

Abstract

Countless marine organisms were polluted with radioactive materials that were dispersed when the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (FDNPP) was damaged in 2011 by the Great East Japan Earthquake. The aim of this study was to determine the degree to which marine herbivorous sea urchins, Mesocentrotus nudus, were contaminated with radiocesium because of the accident. We collected samples of sea urchins from four locations in Fukushima prefecture (at the coast and offshore from the Yotsukura and Ena stations) and investigated how the 137Cs activity concentrations changed. The biological half-life (Tbio) of 137Cs in the individual sea urchins was between 121 and 157 days. The ecological half-life (Teco) of 137Cs was 181-423 days and was high in places close to the FDNPP. The Teco values in the sea urchins were longer than previously reported. The results infer that the food sources of the sea urchins around the Fukushima coast strongly influenced their uptake of 137Cs.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Animals
Cesium Radioisotopes / analysis
Fukushima Nuclear Accident*
Japan
Nuclear Power Plants
Radiation Monitoring*
Sea Urchins
Water Pollutants, Radioactive* / analysis

Substances

Cesium Radioisotopes
Water Pollutants, Radioactive
Cesium-137

Supplementary concepts

Echinacea, sea urchins

Grants and funding

This research was supported by the JSPS KAKENHI Grant (16H04960) from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japan. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.