Abstract
raditional ecotoxicological studies have mostly relied on standard ecotoxicological tests (SETs). In SETs, organisms are exposed to a series of pollutant concentrations, and lethal and sublethal effects are monitored for a short period (24-96 hours). The SET results have been widely used for national and international legislations, at least in the past five decades. However, current legislations fall short in protecting diversity across local to continental scales, partly because the context-dependent toxicity which cannot be revealed from SET. To address these issues, I have, for over a decade, experimentally tested the role of eco-evolutionary context (eco-: food availability, density, competition, predation stress, dispersal, spatial habitat heterogeneity; evo-: transgenerational plasticity, contemporary evolution, thermal adaptation) in shaping the vulnerability of 30+ Arctic-tropical aquatic animal species (copepods, daphnids, insects) to pollutants (metals, pesticides, PAHs, microplastics). Further, I have also explored how other stressors associated with climate change, such as global warming, heatwaves, coastal freshening, and ocean acidification, may either intensify (trade-offs) or, sometimes, nullify (cross-tolerance) the pollutant effects on exposed animals. Finally, I argue the significance of winter as a key driver of eco-evolutionary processes in driving the interaction of multiple stressors in the global change studies with applications for the natural world.