Lake in Dire Straits

The oldest and deepest lake in the world is in dire straits.

Despite widespread concerns about preserving Russia’s fabled Lake Baikal, the world’s largest body of fresh water, researchers report that pollution is continuing.

Lake Baikal holds 20 percent of the world’s unfrozen freshwater and is home to more than 1,500 species found nowhere else on earth. But compared to other areas in the world such as North America and Western Europe, little is known about the regional contamination to plant and animal life from compounds called perfluorochemicals (PFCs), according to a new study published in the April 15 issue of ACS journal Environmental Science & Technology.

In the study, Hisato Itawa and colleagues measured levels of PFCs in the livers and sera of Baikal seals — the only entirely freshwater seal species in the world — and then compared them to recorded levels in 1992. They found that several chemicals were elevated to indicate an ongoing source of contamination in the lake.

"Given these results, continuous monitoring of PFCs as well as dioxin-like compounds in Baikal seals is necessary to assess potential biological effects of PFCs," the study report said. The researchers noted a commercially manufactured PFC known as perfluorononanoic acid to be highest in the Baikal seals.

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Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons