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Abstract

Method of detecting chronic exposure of an organism to a pollutant, and for evaluating biological damage due to chronic exposure to sublethal levels of pollutants and kits for carrying out the method are disclosed. The methods comprise: (a) sampling at least one organism in order to determine whether it has been chronically exposed to a sublethal concentration of one or more pollutants in its environment, under sampling conditions that do not induce any additional heat shock protein (hsp) response in the organism; (b) obtaining a sample of cells or secretions of said organism, suspected of having elevated levels of heat shock proteins and solubilizing the heat shock proteins in the sample; and (c) measuring the concentration of a heat shock protein in said sample. The invention also provides methods for evaluating biological damage due to chronic exposure to a sublethal concentration of one or more pollutants comprising detecting chronic exposure of the organism by the above method and then comparing the measured concentration of hsp to a predetermined standard calibration curve which correlates hsp concentration with physiological impairment of growth or reproductive processes, and kits for carrying out the methods.

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First Claim