Malaysian Journal of Analytical Sciences, Vol. 7, No. 2 (2001) 323-326 _________________________________________________________________________________________________ Environmental Biomonitoring: The Possibility of Using Preserved Biological Specimen Lau Seng and Loh Pei Sun Faculty of Resource Science and Technology, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak 94300 Kota Samarahan, Sarawak (Received 6 September 2000) Abstract: Environmental monitoring has become a very important tool in environmental management. However, it is very frequent that some important data on the initial status or conditions of a particular area is not available. This obstructs efforts to rehabilitate a disturbed area or to determine the changes that have taken place over a specific period of development. Biological sampling has been widely practiced by biologists over centuries and it is more likely to find preserved biological specimen of a particular area in museums and laboratories. This paper is to explore the possibility of using the preserved biological specimen to determine/estimate the historical environmental status of the area. The research was conducted using freshwater molluscs collected from Bau District in Sarawak. The samples collected at each site were divided into two portions, one would be analysed for heavy metals immediately while the other portion was preserved in methanol for 6 months before the chemical analysis. The results showed that the metals contents in the tissue of the molluscs differ significantly between the fresh and preserved specimen. However, the contents of metals in the shell of the animals did not indicate any significant variation. The variation of metal contents in the tissues may be related to the solubilisation of fatty tissues by methanol thus causing the metal content to increase per unit weight of the dried tissue. This paper concludes that there is a possibility of using preserved samples for biomonitoring of the earlier environment, however much work on the validation and this approach need to be done. Abstrak: Pemantauan alam sekitar kini merupakan aktiviti pengurusan alam sekitar yang penting. Seringkali keadaan asal sesuatu kawasan yang ingin dikaji tidak dapat diperolehi. Kekurangan pengetahuan keadaan asal sesuatu tempat merumitkan usahan pemulihan kawasan tersebut. Pengumpulan sample-sampel biologi telah lama dilakukan dan ini mungkin menjadi satu punca data yang boleh diterokai. Kertas kerja ini bertujuan meneroka kesesuaian penggunaan sample-sampel biologi terawit bagi menentukan keadaan semulajadi sesuatu kawasan. Kajian dijalankan mengguna sample siput dari Bau, Sarawak. Sampel-sampel siput dikutip dan dibahagi kepada dua bahagian, satunya dianalisis kandungan logam berat dengan serta merta dan satu lagi bahagian diawit di dalam methanol untuk 6 bulan sebelum dianalisis. Keputusan kajian menunjukkan terdapat perbezaan ketara di antara kandungan logam berat di dalam tisu siput yang diawit dan yang segar. Tiada perbezaan signifikan di antara cengkeran yang diawit dan yang segar. Perubahan kandungan logan berat di dalam tisu berkemungkinan disebabkan oleh penglarutan tisu-tisu lemak kedalam methanol dan ini menghasilkan peningkatan kandungan logam berat di dalam tisu siput yang diawit. Kajian ini membuat kesimpulan bahawa penggunaan sampel biologi terawit dalam pemantauan alam sekitar adalah menggalakan. Mamun demikian kajian lanjutan harus diteruskan bagi menjamin kesahihan teknik ini. __________________________________________________________________________________________________ Keywords: preserved biological specimen, environmental monitoring, molluscs heavy metals. Introduction Preserving and conserving the environment of the earth has become an issue that attracts worldwide attention. The world population has finally become more aware of the importance of sustaining our present environment to the continual survival of human civilization. Several world summits have been held to discuss the concerted effort that each nation in the world can undertake to sustain our world environment if improving it is not possible. Out of these summits, several declarations have been made such as the Montreal Protocols (1987), Langkawi Declaration (1989) and the resolutions made at the Earth Summit at Rio de Janeiro (1992). All these declarations propose approaches and steps to be taken to conserve our earth. The successful implementations of these proposed actions are vital and therefore continuous effort in monitoring the states of the environment is crucial. The objectives of the monitoring exercise are to determine if the actions taken are sufficient or correct and what further actions can we take to improve the situations. Among the many environmental monitoring approaches, monitoring of biological species has received much attention from many environmental scientists. The reason for such an interest in biomonitoring is obvious, as the well being of the ecosystem will reflect the overall health of our environment. Many flora and fauna species, of both terrestrial and aquatic, have been selected as biomonitors for various pollutants and among them is the heavy metals in the environment particularly in surface water. Hundreds of articles have been published on this subject, [1] & [2], and the Zebra Mussels Watch Project has been the most widely documented [3]. The procedures in using aquatic fauna, as biomonitors for heavy metals have been well-established and analytical procedures are reliable and well documented. The advantages of the biomonitoring have been discussed at great length in many other authors, [4]&[5]. However, the practice of biomonitoring is limited to a few and only in recent time that this approach has been widely used. Many environmental sensitive location has not been