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Contributions to Toxicity Testing and Toxin Analysis

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Cyanotoxins

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Abstract

Toxicity testing is of key importance both for cyanotoxin research as well as for monitoring and can only partially be replaced by chemical analysis of cyanotoxins. Analytical methods were developed to detect selected known substances, whereas toxicological assays aim at determining the effects of all substances, known or unknown, in a sample. Extracts of cyanobacteria may contain a variety of chemical substances, numerous of which may be unknown, and their potential effect can only be detected by toxicological testing complementary to chemical toxin analysis. The mouse bioassay has been the most widely used toxicity test in cyanotoxin research and in the screening programmes published from several countries in the 1980s and early 1990s (Sivonen and Jones 1999). It involves intraperitoneal injection of cyanobacterial material or extracts into mice and determination of the dose that kills 50% of the mice, the classical LD50 (Berg and Soli 1985; Falconer 1993). Skulberg et al. (1994) classified cyanobacterial toxins (cyanotoxins) by the response to them as observed in the mouse bioassay as hepatotoxins, neurotoxins and toxins with protracted effects. The time of survival and pathologically observable damage to organs were used as parameters for this classification. For ethical reasons (especially pertaining to LD50 tests), because of stringent animal wefare regulations in many countries, and because of time and costs involved, mouse test are unsuitable for large-scale testing of field samples, and the need to replace the mouse bioassay with alternative methods at the suborganismic level is urgent (another reason being a lack of adequeate diagnostic/mechanistic end points). Chapter 8.1 shows that cellular assays are a promising tool for monitoring cyanobacterial toxicity, and Chapter 8.2 provides verification for a cellular microcystin aasay comparing the results to those of the mouse bioassay.

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  1. Umweltbundesamt (Federal Environmental Agency), Corrensplatz 1, 14195, Berlin, Germany

    Dr. Ingrid Chorus

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  1. Umweltbundesamt (Federal Environmental Agency), Corrensplatz 1, 14195, Berlin, Germany

    Ingrid Chorus

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Chorus, I. (2001). Contributions to Toxicity Testing and Toxin Analysis. In: Chorus, I. (eds) Cyanotoxins. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-59514-1_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-59514-1_8

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