Used of fish immune response in environmental risk assessment

Growing awareness of the value of ecosystems is linked with the increasing demand by citizens and environmental organizations for cleaner rivers and lakes, groundwater and coastal beaches. This citizens demand is one of the main reasons why the Commission has made water protection one of its priorities. This explains the restructuring process of the Water Framework Directive (WFD 2000/60/EC) which concerns the general protection of aquatic ecology, specific protection of unique and valuable habitats, protection of drinking water resources, and protection of bathing water. Two elements are integrated in the ecological protection of surface waters: the "good ecological status" and the "good chemical status". Thus, the environmental objectives concern long-term sustainable water management based on a high level of protection of the aquatic environment and the introduction of the principle of preventing any further deterioration of the ecological and chemical status. In fact, the introduction of several environmental pollutants in freshwaters induces adverse effects in aquatic ecosystems by the disturbance of several physiological processes of aquatic organisms. This modification of the ecosystem could be avoided by increasing our knowledge on the chemical injuries induced on the main physiological functions, such as reproduction, maintenance, survival and behavior. In this way, we want to demonstrate the interest of fish immune response in environmental risk assessment using different river samplings