Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Units Program: Maine
Education, Research and Technical Assistance for Managing Our Natural Resources

PFAS compounds are of increasing human health and environmental concern. Ensuring efficient and representative sampling will be important to evaluating PFAS risk in Maine. Variability exists in current fish collection methods, sample sizes, species, and waterbodies sampled within and outside of Maine. Age, sex, size, metabolic rate, and other characteristics may influence PFAS accumulation for individual fish. The PFAS compounds in water responsible for accumulation in fish may also change seasonality with variability in hydrological conditions. This project aims to tackle questions on how this variability, variability within a species and variability across species impacts assimilation and sample results in Maine fishes.