Flutterby™! : Salmon Deaths

Not just microplastics in the ocean: Common tire chemical implicated in mysterious deaths of at-risk salmon — Coho salmon in urban streams have been dying in the U.S. Pacific Northwest

Online today[Dec. 3, 2020] in Science, researchers led by Kolodziej report the primary culprit comes from a chemical widely used to protect tires from ozone, a reactive atmospheric gas. The toxicant, called 6PPD-quinone, leaches out of the particles that tires shed onto pavement. Even small doses killed coho salmon in the lab. "It's a brilliant piece of work," says Miriam Diamond, an environmental chemist at the University of Toronto. "They've done a tremendous job at sleuthing out a very challenging problem."