Single and combined effects of Ni and Cr on the freshwater ostracod Cypridopsis vidua

Mining can provide abundant resources, but it also causes heavy metal wastewater pollution, which poses a serious threat to aquatic ecosystems. In this study, Cypridopsis vidua was used as the test organism to investigate the single and combined acute toxicity of common heavy metals (such as chromium (Cr) and nickel (Ni)) in mining wastewater. Then, a random forest model (RF model) was used to predict the combined toxicity of chromium and nickel. Single acute toxicity experiments showed that the 96 h-LC50 values of the Cr and Ni for Cypridopsis vidua were 0.81 mg/L and 4.3 mg/L, respectively. aCr was more toxic than Ni. Furthermore, the combined acute toxicity experiments demonstrated that the toxicity of Cr-Ni was higher than Ni but lower than Cr. The predicted results of the RF model were highly consistent with the experimental results of the Cr-Ni combined acute toxicity. So, the model has accurate toxicity prediction ability.