147 research outputs found

    Chronic environmentally relevant levels of simvastatin disrupt embryonic development, biochemical and molecular responses in zebrafish (Danio rerio)

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    This is the postprint (accepted manuscript) version of the article published in Aquatic Toxicology. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aquatox.2018.05.014Simvastatin (SIM), a hypocholesterolaemic compound, is among the most prescribed pharmaceuticals for cardiovascular disease prevention worldwide. Several studies have shown that acute exposure to SIM causes multiple adverse effects in aquatic organisms. However, uncertainties still remain regarding the chronic effects of SIM in aquatic ecosystems. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the effects of SIM in the model freshwater teleost zebrafish (Danio rerio) following a chronic exposure (90 days) to environmentally relevant concentrations ranging from 8 ng/L to 1000 ng/L. This study used a multi-parameter approach integrating distinct ecologically-relevant endpoints, i.e. survival, growth, reproduction and embryonic development, with biochemical markers (cholesterol and triglycerides). Real Time PCR was used to analyse the transcription levels of key genes involved in the mevalonate pathway (hmgcra, cyp51, and dhcr7). Globally, SIM induced several effects that did not follow a dose-response relationship; embryonic development, biochemical and molecular markers, were significantly impacted in the lower concentrations, 8 ng/L, 40 ng/L and/or 200 ng/L, whereas no effects were recorded for the highest tested SIM levels (1000 ng/L). Taken together, these findings expand our understanding of statin effects in teleosts, demonstrating significant impacts at environmentally relevant concentrations and highlight the importance of addressing the effects of chemicals under chronic low-level concentrationsT. Neuparth was supported by the Postdoctoral fellowship SFRH/BPD/77912/2011 from Foundation of Science and Technology, Portugal. R. Montes, R. Rodil and J.B. Quintana acknowledge financial support from the Spanish “Agencia Estatal de Investigación” (project no. CTM2014-56628-C3-2-R), the Galician Council of Culture, Education and Universities (ED431C2017/36) and FEDER/ERDFS

    Production and nutrimental quality of cowpea pods, Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp, as function of topological arrangement and fertilization type

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    El frijol chino (FC) se utiliza en alimentación humana y se cultiva en espaldera viva de maíz, pero, son escasos los estudios sobre arreglos topológicos adecuados. En este sistema, la biofertilización (BIO) y fertilización foliar (FF) podrían complementar la nutrición. En Huitzuco, Guerrero, México, durante el periodo lluvioso se sembró FC tipo guía en espaldera de maíz a 80 (D8) y 160 cm (D16) de distancia entre hileras (D), con y sin BIO (B y SB) y con y sin FF (F y SF), para determinar los efectos de D, BIO y FF sobre el rendimiento y calidad nutrimental de vainas. La emergencia del FC se presentó a los 6 días después de la siembra (dds), la floración a los 58 dds, el primer corte de vaina a los 70 dds y el último a los 110 dds. El mayor rendimiento de vaina se logró con D8-B-F (851 g m-2), seguido por D8-SB-F (758 g m-2) y D16-B-F (657 g m-2), con los que se generó la más alta concentración de minerales (6,5%) y proteínas (28,1%), y la menor de carbohidratos solubles y fibras. El mayor rendimiento y calidad nutricional de vaina verde se obtuvo con D8-B-F.Cowpea (FC) is usedin human feeding, and is cultivated on maize living trellis; however, few studies about suitable topological arrangements are available. Plant nutrition in this system could be completed by biofertilization (BIO) and foliar fertilization (FF). In Huitzuco, Guerrero. Mexico, during the rainy season FC guide type was sowing on trellis maize at 80(D8) and 160 cm (D16) of distance between rows (D), with and without BIO (B and SB), and with and without FF(F and SF), in order to determine the effect of D, BIO and FF on yield and nutritional quality of pods. Emergency of FC occurred at 6 days after sowing (dds); flowering at 58 dds; the first pod cut at 70 dds and the last at 110 dds. The higher pod yield was achieved with D8-B-F (851 g m-2), followed by D8-SB-F (758 g m-2) and D16-B-F (657 g m-2). This last treatment also generated the highest concentration of minerals (6.5%) and proteins (28.1%), but less carbohydrates and fiber. The highest yield and quality of green pod was obtained with D8-B-F.Fil: Apáez Barrios, Patricio. Universidad Michoacana de San Nicolás de HidalgoFil: Escalante Estrada, José Alberto Salvador. Colegio de Postgraduados. Campus Montecillo (México)Fil: Sosa Montes, Eliseo. Universidad Autónoma Chapingo (México)Fil: Apáez Barrios, Maricela. Colegio de Postgraduados. Campus Montecillo (México)Fil: Rodríguez González, María Teresa. Colegio de Postgraduados. Campus Montecillo (México)Fil: Raya Montaño, Yurixhi Atenea. Universidad Michoacana de San Nicolás de Hidalg

    Contribución al conocimiento de la flora briofítica de la comarca de la Axarquía y la ZEC Sierra de Camarolos (Málaga, España)

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    Through the collection of samples and study of 61 localities, the bryophytic flora of the Axarquía region and the ZEC Sierra de Camarolos is studied. The bryophyte diversity is estimated at 140 species, of which 124 are mosses and 16 liverworts. Husnotiella sinuosa (Mitt.) J.A. Jiménez & M.J. Cano is recorded for the first time from Andalusia, Orthotrichum macrocephalum F. Lara, Garilleti & Mazimpaka, O. schimperi Hammar, and Tortella inflexa (Bruch) Broth. are reported for the first time from Malaga province. Most of the species in the catalogue (about 85%) are new for the studied territory.Resumen Mediante las recolecciones en un total de 61 localidades muestreadas, se lleva a cabo un estudio de la flora briofítica de la comarca de la Axarquía (Málaga) y la ZEC Sierra de Camarolos (Málaga). La diversidad briofítica se estima en 140 especies, de ellas 124 son musgos y 16 hepáticas. Husnotiella sinuosa (Mitt.) J.A. Jiménez & M.J. Cano se cita por vez primera de Andalucía, Orthotrichum macrocephalum F. Lara, Garilleti & Mazimpaka, O. schimperi Hammar y Tortella inflexa (Bruch) Broth. son novedades para la brioflora malacitana. La mayoría de las especies del catálogo (alrededor del 85%) son novedades para el territorio estudiado

    Occurrence of persistent and mobile chemicals and other contaminants of emerging concern in Spanish and Portuguese wastewater treatment plants, transnational river basins and coastal water

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    This work investigated, during one year, the occurrence and fate of 52 contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) in transnational river basins and coastal areas of the North of Portugal and Galicia (NW Spain) and the wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) discharging on these environments. The different CECs investigated included pharmaceuticals, personal care products, industrial chemicals, among others, of which ca. 90 % would fulfill the persistence, mobility and toxicity criteria proposed by the German Environmental Agency. The results showed the ubiquitous presence of these CECs and an incomplete removal of over 60 % of them with current conventional WWTPs. These findings highlight the requirement of a prominent and coordinated upgrade of WWTP treatments in order to meet the future European Union regulations on urban wastewater treatment and surface water quality. In fact, even some compounds exhibiting high removals, such as caffeine or xylene sulfonate, were frequently detected in river and estuarine waters at the high ng L−1 level. Thus, our preliminary risk assessment study concluded that 18 of the CECs presented a potential risk for the environment, being caffeine, sulpiride, perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), diclofenac, fipronil and perfluorobutanoic acid (PFBA) the most concerning ones. Yet, additional toxicity data as well as a more robust information on persistence and mobility of CECs are necessary for better estimating the magnitude of the problem and improve risk assessment. As an example, in the case of the antidiabetic metformin, recent research has revealed toxicity for model fish species at concentration levels below those found in 40 % of the river water samples analyzed in this workThis work was financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the Interreg V-A Spain-Portugal Programme (POCTEP) 2014-2020 (ref. 0725_NOR_WATER_1_P), the Agencia Estatal de Investigación MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 (ref. PID2020-117686RB-C32) and the Consellería de Cultura, Educación y Universidades da Xunta de Galicia (ref. ED431C 2021/06). The study was also supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) under the projects [UIDB/04423/2020 and UIDP/04423/2020]. R.M. acknowledges Banco Santander and Universidade de Santiago de Compostela for her outstanding researcher contract, N. A. acknowledges the FCT for his Ph.D. grant DFA/BD/6218/2020 and T.N. acknowledges FCT Individual Call to Scientific Employment Stimulus 2022 (2022.02925.CEECIND). The authors also want to acknowledge Agilent Technologies for providing the equipment described in Section 2.4 and the different entities which have collaborated in the sampling campaign: VIAQUA, Augas de Galicia, Confederación Hidrográfica do Miño-Sil, Águas do Porto, Efacec and Águas do NorteS

    Transcriptomic data on the transgenerational exposure of the keystone amphipod Gammarus locusta to simvastatin

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    The use of transcriptomics data brings new insights and works as a powerful tool to explore the molecular mode of action (MoA) of transgenerational inheritance effects of contaminants of emerging concern. Therefore, in this dataset, we present the transcriptomic data of the transgenerational effects of environmentally relevant simvastatin levels, one of the most prescribed human pharmaceuticals, in the keystone amphipod species Gammarus locusta. In summary, G. locusta juveniles were maintained under simvastatin exposure up to adulthood (exposed group - F0E) and the offspring of F0E were transferred to control water for the three subsequent generations (transgenerational group - F1T, F2T and F3T). To gain insights into the biological functions and canonical pathways transgenerationally disrupted by simvastatin, a G. locusta de novo transcriptome assembly was produced and the transcriptomic profiles of three individual G. locusta females, per group, over the four generations (F0 to F3) - solvent control groups (F0.C, F1.C, F2.C and F3.C), F0 320 ng/L simvastatin exposed group (F0.320E) and F1 to F3 320 transgenerational group (F1.320T; F2.320T and F3.320T) - were analyzed. Briefly, Illumina HiSeq™ 2500 platform was used to perform RNA sequencing, and due to the unavailability of G. locusta genome, the RNA-seq datasets were assembled de novo using Trinity and annotated with Trinotate software. After assembly and post-processing steps, 106093 transcripts with N50 of 2371 bp and mean sequence length of 1343.98 bp was produced. BUSCO analyses showed a transcriptome with gene completeness of 97.5 % Arthropoda library profile. The Bowtie2, RSEM and edgeR tools were used for the differential gene expression (DEGs) analyses that allowed the identification of a high quantity of genes differentially expressed in all generations. Finally, to identify the main metabolic pathways affected by the transgenerational effects of SIM across all generations, the DGEs genes were blasted onto KEGG pathways database using the KAAS webserver. The data furnished in this article allows a better molecular understanding of the transgenerational effects produced by simvastatin in the keystone amphipod G. locusta and has major implications for hazard and risk assessment of pharmaceuticals and other emerging contaminants. This article is related to the research article entitled “Transgenerational inheritance of chemical-induced signature: a case study with simvastatinThis article was developed under the Transobesogen project - Trans-phyletic obesogenic responses: from epigenetic modules to transgenerational environmental impacts (reference PTDC/CTA-AMB/31544/2017 - NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-031544), cofunded by Portugal 2020, the European Union through the ERDF and by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology – FCT. This article was also supported by FCT through national funds (UIDB/04423/2020; UIDP/04423/2020), by the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación (CTM2017-84763-C3-2-R) and by the Galician Council of Culture, Education and Universities (ED431C2017/36), cofounded by ERDF. A PhD grant awarded to Susana Barros acknowledges the doctoral grant attributed by FCT with reference PD/BD/143090/2018S

    Transgenerational inheritance of chemical-induced signature: A case study with simvastatin

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    The hypothesis that exposure to certain environmental chemicals during early life stages may disrupt reproduction across multiple non-exposed generations has significant implications for understanding disease etiology and adverse outcomes. We demonstrate here reproductive multi and transgenerational effects, at environmentally relevant levels, of one of the most prescribed human pharmaceuticals, simvastatin, in a keystone species, the amphipod Gammarus locusta. The transgenerational findings has major implications for hazard and risk assessment of pharmaceuticals and other contaminants of emerging concern given that transgenerational effects of environmental chemicals are not addressed in current hazard and risk assessment schemes. Considering that the mevalonate synthesis, one of the key metabolic pathways targeted by simvastatin, is highly conserved among metazoans, these results may also shed light on the potential transgenerational effects of simvastatin on other animals, including humans.This research was funded by COMPETE 2020, Portugal 2020, the European Union through the ERDF and the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology – FCT (Transobesogen project – Trans-phyletic obesogenic responses: from epigenetic modules to transgenerational environmental impacts, reference: PTDC/CTA-AMB/31544/2017 – NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-031544). This research was also supported by the National Funds through FCT under the projects (UIDB/04423/2020; UIDP/04423/2020), by the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación (CTM2017-84763-C3-2-R), and by the Galician Council of Culture, Education and Universities (ED431C2017/36), cofounded by ERDF. A PhD grant awarded to Susana Barros (PD/BD/143090/2018) was funded by the FCTS

    Screening of contaminants of emerging concern in surface water and wastewater effluents, assisted by the Persistency-Mobility-Toxicity Criteria

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    Contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) are compounds of diverse origins that have not been deeply studied in the past which are now accruing growing environmental interest. The NOR-Water project aimed to identify the main CECs and their sources in the water environment of Northern Portugal–Galicia (located in northwest Spain) transnational region. To achieve these goals, a suspect screening analytical methodology based on the use of liquid chromatography coupled to high resolution mass spectrometry (LC-HRMS) was applied to 29 sampling sites in two campaigns. These sampling sites included river and sea water, as well as treated wastewater. The screening was driven by a library of over 3500 compounds, which included 604 compounds prioritized from different relevant lists on the basis of the persistency, mobility, and toxicity criteria. Thus, a total of 343 chemicals could be tentatively identified in the analyzed samples. This list of 343 identified chemicals was submitted to the classification workflow used for prioritization and resulted in 153 chemicals tentatively classified as persistent, mobile, and toxic (PMT) and 23 as very persistent and very mobile (vMvP), pinpointing the relevance of these types of chemicals in the aqueous environment. Pharmaceuticals, such as the antidepressant venlafaxine or the antipsychotic sulpiride, and industrial chemicals, especially high production volume chemicals (HPVC) such as ε-caprolactam, were the groups of compounds that were detected at the highest frequencies.This research was funded by Xunta de Galicia (ED431C 2021/06) and the European Regional Development Fund through the Interreg V-A Spain-Portugal Programme (POCTEP) 2014-2020 (ref. 0725_NOR_WATER_1_P). R. M. acknowledges Banco Santander and Universidade de Santiago de Compostela for her outstanding researcher contract and N. A. acknowledges the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) for his Ph.D. grant DFA/BD/6218/2020.S

    An Innovative Photoreactor, FluHelik, To Promote UVC/H2O2 Photochemical Reactions: Tertiary Treatment of an Urban Wastewater

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    This is the accepted manuscript of the following article: Espíndola et al. Science of the Total Environment, 2019, 667, 197-207. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.02.335An innovative photoreactor, FluHelik, was used to promote the degradation of contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) by a photochemical UVC/H2O2 process. First, the system was optimized for the oxidation of a model antibiotic, oxytetracycline (OTC), using both ultrapure water (UPW) and a real urban wastewater (UWW) (collected after secondary treatment) as solution matrices. Following, the process was evaluated for the treatment of a UWW spiked with a mixture of OTC and 10 different pharmaceuticals established by the Swiss legislation at residual concentrations (∑CECs <660 μg L−1). The performance of the FluHelik reactor was analyzed both at lab and pre-pilot scale in multiple and single pass flow modes. The efficiency of the FluHelik photoreactor, at lab-scale, was evaluated at different operational conditions (H2O2 concentration, UVC lamp power (4, 6 and 11 W) and flow rate) and further compared with a conventional Jets photoreactor. Both photoreactors exhibited similar OTC removal efficiencies at the best conditions; however, the FluHelik reactor showed to be more efficient (1.3 times) in terms of mineralization when compared with the Jets reactor. Additionally, the efficiency of the UVC/H2O2 photochemical system using the FluHelik photoreactor in reducing the toxicity of the real effluent containing 11 pharmaceuticals was evaluated through zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryo toxicity bioassays. FluHelik scale-up from laboratory to pre-pilot to promote UVC/H2O2 photochemical process proved to be feasibleThis work was financially supported by: Associate Laboratory LSRE-LCM - UID/EQU/50020/2019 - funded by national funds through FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC). V.J.P. Vilar acknowledges the FCT Investigator 2013 Programme (IF/00273/2013). J.C.A. Espíndola acknowledges CNPq (Brazil) for his scholarship (205781/2014-4). R. Montes, R. Rodil and J.B. Quintana acknowledge the financial support of Spanish "Agencia Estatal de Investigación" (ref. CTM2017-84763-C3-R-2) and Xunta de Galicia (ref. ED431C2017/36), both confounded by FEDER/ERDFS

    Producción y calidad nutrimental de vaina del frijol chino, Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp, en función de arreglo topológico y tipo de fertilización

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    Cowpea (FC) is usedin human feeding, and is cultivated on maize living trellis; however, few studies about suitable topological arrangements are available. Plant nutrition in this system could be completed by biofertilization (BIO) and foliar fertilization (FF). In Huitzuco, Guerrero. Mexico, during the rainy season FC guide type was sowing on trellis maize at 80(D8) and 160 cm (D16) of distance between rows (D), with and without BIO (B and SB), and with and without FF(F and SF), in order to determine the effect of D, BIO and FF on yield and nutritional quality of pods. Emergency of FC occurred at 6 days after sowing (dds); flowering at 58 dds; the first pod cut at 70 dds and the last at 110 dds. The higher pod yield was achieved with D8-B-F (851 g m-2), followed by D8-SB-F (758 g m-2) and D16-B-F (657 g m-2). This last treatment also generated the highest concentration of minerals (6.5%) and proteins (28.1%), but less carbohydrates and fiber. The highest yield and quality of green pod was obtained with D8-B-F.El frijol chino (FC) se utiliza en alimentación humana y se cultiva en espaldera viva de maíz, pero, son escasos los estudios sobre arreglos topológicos adecuados. En este sistema, la biofertilización (BIO) y fertilización foliar (FF) podrían complementar la nutrición. En Huitzuco, Guerrero, México, durante el periodo lluvioso se sembró FC tipo guía en espaldera de maíz a 80 (D8) y 160 cm (D16) de distancia entre hileras (D), con y sin BIO (B y SB) y con y sin FF (F y SF), para determinar los efectos de D, BIO y FF sobre el rendimiento y calidad nutrimental de vainas. La emergencia del FC se presentó a los 6 días después de la siembra (dds), la floración a los 58 dds, el primer corte de vaina a los 70 dds y el último a los 110 dds. El mayor rendimiento de vaina se logró con D8-B-F (851 g m-2), seguido por D8-SB-F (758 g m-2) y D16-B-F (657 g m-2), con los que se generó la más alta concentración de minerales (6,5%) y proteínas (28,1%), y la menor de carbohidratos solubles y fibras. El mayor rendimiento y calidad nutricional de vaina verde se obtuvo con D8-B-F
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