Toxicology expert, Sandra Wise, discusses long-term effects of the Gulf Oil Spill

On November 9, Sandra Wise, Director of the Wise Laboratory of Environmental and Genetic Toxicology at the University of Southern Maine, came to lecture at the University of Bridgeport on her research team's findings on the impact of the Gulf Oil spill on whale species and the Gulf of Mexico ecosystem.

            The lecture was open to the public as part of UB's Biology Department Lecture Series on the Sciences.

            The 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill is the largest oil spill near American shores in the history of the United States of America, as Wise pointed out. The environmental tragedy began on April 20, 2010, when an explosion occurred aboard the Deepwater Horizon, an offshore drilling platform owned by British Petroleum (BP). With 126 people aboard, the rig exploded and caught fire, injuring 17 people and killing 11 others. Millions of gallons of oil gushed into the Gulf of Mexico for three months after the explosion, leading to extensive death rates at all levels of the ecosystem.

            In an effort to clean up the oil spilled into the ocean and to prevent it from washing up onto American beaches, BP began treating the oil with Corexit, a dispersant used to break up oil. Normally, oil and water don't mix; however, when treated with dispersants like Corexit, the oil is dispersed through all layers of ocean water, much of it sinking all the way down to the ocean floor where it comes into contact with deep water marine life, including mammals like the Sperm whales that were studied by Wise's research team.

            According to website for the Wise Laboratory of Environmental and Genetic Toxicology, their research seeks to "understand how toxic a chemical is to a marine species and amphibians in an effort to understand how environmental pollutants might be endangering them," and focuses on "damage to DNA, since this type of damage can interfere with the ability of these species to reproduce and the ability of their offspring to survive."

            Since sperm whales are at the top of the food chain in the Gulf of Mexico, the health of the species is being studied by the Wise team because it indicates the health of the ecosystem as a whole, from the bottom, all the way up to the top of the food chain. These mammals are studied as a way to indicate the health of the whole marine ecosystem and the effects of the environmental contamination caused by the widespread use of Corexit, which contains chromium and nickel.

In humans, high levels of nickel and chromium have been known to cause cancer. This fact instigates fears of consuming seafood from the Gulf of Mexico, as consumers fear contamination by eating fish that are part of this toxic ecosystem.

            The Wise research team has spent the last two summers collecting data in the Gulf of Mexico and will continue this research for at least the next three years, pending funding for the project. Wise mentioned during the lecture that the effects of this oil spill will take years to come to light, so just because oil floating on the ocean surface is no longer easily seen does not mean that the oil is not there or that the tragedy is over.