L. Guzzella et S. Sora, MUTAGENIC ACTIVITY OF LAKE WATER SAMPLES USED AS DRINKING-WATER RESOURCES IN NORTHERN ITALY, Water research (Oxford), 32(6), 1998, pp. 1733-1742
The three main lakes in Northern Italy (Como, Garda and Maggiore) were
studied in order to investigate their potential mutagenic activity in
relation to their present use as drinking water supplies. Lakewater s
amples were collected by an automatic autosampler, concentrated in sit
u with a XAD-2 filled column and tested with the Ames assay (TA98 and
TA100 strains with and without S9 addition). The results of the Ames t
est show that the highest water mutagenic activity is obtained when TA
98 strain with S9 mix is used, moreover they indicate higher mutagenic
response in Come lakewaters than in the two other lake samples. The c
hemical characterization of the water extracts were carried out quanti
fying some agricultural and industrial organic micropollutants with GC
-NPD techniques and identifying the main water chemical composition wi
th GC-MS. The chemical analysis allowed the identification of some pol
lutants that may be responsible for a fraction of the observed lake wa
ter mutagenicity. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.