contact with water during the filtration process (Jebali et al.
2014; Sohail et al. 2016). Furthermore, the large surface area
of gill, the chemical nature of ctenedial mucus, the direct metal
introduction by endocytosis, and the presence of
metallothioneins are all factors that contribute to fixing metals
within the gill.
Many authors had reported the high aptitude of two mussel
organs gill and digestive gland in the storage process of heavy
metals as Viarengo et al. (1990), Sreedevi et al. (1992),
Amiard et al. (1993), Stien et al. (1998), Blasco and Puppo
(1999), Vlahogianni et al. (2007), Peyrot et al. (2009), Cooper
et al. (2010), Giarratano et al. (2011), Jebali et al. (2014),
Fig. 5 (continued)
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