Book Description

Modeling the Fate and Effect of the Toxic Substances in the Environment contains the proceedings of a Symposium on "Modeling the Fate and Effect of Toxic Substances in the Environment", held on June 6-10, 1983 in Copenhagen, Denmark, and sponsored by the International Society for Ecological Modeling. The symposium provided a forum for discussing the state of the art in modeling the fate and effect of toxic substances in the environment. Topics include parameter estimation, theoretical considerations, and models of a wide variety of toxic compounds in aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. Comprised of 16 chapters, this volume begins with an account of parameter estimation in toxic substance models, followed by a discussion on extinction and persistence in models of population-toxicant interactions. The reader is then introduced to PATHWAY, a simulation model of the transport of radionuclides through agroecosystems. Subsequent chapters focus on possible cause-effect relationships in the dying of Germany's spruce-fir forests; application of risk and uncertainty analysis techniques to a heavy metal speciation model; the biological effects of toxicants in aquatic microcosm systems; and the dispersal and biological effect of toxins in the Tamar estuary in England. The book concludes with a description of a nonlinear mathematical model for the transport and spreading of oil slicks. This book will be useful to students, practitioners, and researchers in the field of inorganic chemistry, as well as those who are interested in the environmental effects of toxic compounds.