Exposure to chemical contaminants is often invoked to explain recruitment failures to populations of sturgeon worldwide, but there is little empirical evidence to support the idea that young sturgeon are sensitive at environmentally relevant concentrations. The authors used shortnose sturgeon (Acipenser brevirostum) and Atlantic sturgeon (Acipenser oxyrinchus) as models to investigate the sensi...

The AHR pathway activates transcription of CYP1A and mediates most toxic responses from exposure to halogenated aromatic hydrocarbon contaminants such as PCBs and PCDD/Fs. Therefore, expression of CYP1A is predictive of most higher level toxic responses from these chemicals. To date, no study had developed an assay to quantify CYP1A expression in any sturgeon species. We addressed this deficien...

Following a 7.5-h transport haul, juvenile pallid sturgeon (Scaphirhynchus albus) showed a small but significant increase in plasma cortisol to 4.7 ng ml but similar increases did not occur after fish were handled in a net held in the air for 30 s. Subsequent experiments on yearling pallid sturgeon and hybrid pallid×shovelnose (S. albus×platorynchus) sturgeon using the same 30-s handling stress...