Toxic effects of Emphasis Type="Italic"Karenia m

Authors: Yang Chen Tian Yan Rencheng Yu Mingjiang Zhou

Publish Date: 2011/07/10

Volume: 29, Issue: 4, Pages: 860-868

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Abstract

Karenia is one of the most harmful and representative red tide genus in a temperate zone Blooms caused by this genus have resulted in massive fish death in the South China Sea and the East China Sea However the potential effects of this dinoflagellate on human health through the transfer of toxins via marine food webs and the mechanisms of toxicity are still unknown Therefore we examined the toxic effects of a strain of K mikimotoi isolated from the South China Sea on the proliferation and morphology of four mammalian cell lines two normal cell lines and two cancer cell lines In addition we carried out a preliminary investigation on the mechanism of toxicity of the alga The results show that the polar lipidsoluble component of K mikimotoi significantly inhibited proliferation of the four cell lines and resulted in the cells becoming spherical swollen and damaged The result of Annexin V and PI doublestaining confirmed that cell membranes were disrupted The malonaldehyde MDA contents in the medium of the four cell lines treated with the polarlipid extracts all increased significantly which indicates that the polarlipid toxins produced by K mikimotoi could adversely affect mammalian cells by inducing lipid peroxidation We conclude that K mikimotoi is a potential threat to human health and the comprehensive effect of this dinoflagellate and its mechanisms should be investigated furtherSupported by the National Basic Research Program of China 973 Program No 2010CB428700 the National Natural Science Foundation of China Nos U0733006 40821004 and the Knowledge Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences No KZCX2YWQ0702

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