Effects of Organic and Inorganic Mercury on the Apoptosis of the Neural Tube Cells of Zebrafish Embryos (Danio rerio)

Hassan, Said A.; Abbott, L. C.; Moussa, E. A.

doi:10.21608/jva.2017.37156

Effects of Organic and Inorganic Mercury on the Apoptosis of the Neural Tube Cells of Zebrafish Embryos (Danio rerio)

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Department of Anatomy and Embryology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Suez Canal University, Ismailia 41522, Egypt.

² Department of Veterinary Integrative Biosciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, Texas A&M University USA

³ aDepartment of Anatomy and Embryology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Suez Canal University

10.21608/jva.2017.37156

Abstract

Abstract
In this study, we tested the hypothe- sis that mercury-induced develop- mental toxicity was mediated via ec- topic occurrence of apoptosis during embryonic development. We em- ployed microscopy to acquire images of whole-mount staining of apoptotic cells in zebrafish embryo exposed to 5, 10, 50, 80, 100, 150 ppb me hg and 50, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 ppb hg cl from 5 hours post fertilization (hpf) to 48hpf.
In mercury-treated embryos with var- ying degrees of gross developmental malformations, significantly higher numbers of apoptotic cells were de- tected with this method. In the de- generating neural tube of mercury treated embryos apoptotic cells were detected, while in the healthy neural tube of the untreated controls no apoptotic cells were found. The per- centages of apoptotic cells increased with the dose in both Me hg and Hg cl exposure. Exposure to mercury, therefore, induced ectopic apoptosis at 84 hpf.

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