Trace Metals (Cu, Cd, Pb, Zn, and Ni,) Concentrations in the Sea Cucumber Holothuria tubulosa (Gmelin, 1791) of the Algerian West Coast

The present work was organized to evaluate the trace metal contaminations of Cu, Cd, Pb, Zn, and Ni in the organs of Holothuria tubulosa (Gmelin, 1791), at two sites on the Algerian west coast; Ain Franine (AF) and Sidi Lakhdar (SL). The obtained concentrations revealed the presence of heterogeneous metal contents and showed that the most important concentrations were relatively detected in zinc, with values of the male gonads at the level of AF (16.39 ± 2.38 mg / kg PF) for winter and SL (4.65 ± 0.59mg / kg PF) for summer. The lowest zinc values were recorded on the integument for the two sites. The highest Cu values were recorded in spring on the integument of two groups of Holothuria tubulosa. Nickel concentrations showed a high value in the integuments in males (1.08 ± 0.03mg / kgP.F) at AF during summer and at SL in spring (0.93 ± 0.02mg / kg PF). While they recorded the lowest values in winter for sea cucumbers of FA and in spring for those of SL for the same organ. The lead concentrations revealed high values on the integument with (1.77 ± 0.56 mg / kg PF) in winter for SL sea cucumbers and (1.36 ± 0.04 mg / kg PF) in summer for those from AF. Moreover, cadmium targeted the same organ as lead where high values were noticed on the integuments during fall for the two communities of sea cucumbers of the order of (0.51 ± 0.03 mg / kg PF) to AF and from (0.43 ± 0.01mg / kg PF) to SL. The analysis of the metal concentrations obtained revealed that, despite the difference in the biotope, the two communities of Holothuria tubulosa did not present a significant difference (P> 0.005) for all the metals considered.