TY - JOUR
T1 - Effect of chromium oxide (III) nanoparticles on the production of reactive oxygen species and photosystem II activity in the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii
AU - Costa, Cristina Henning da
AU - Perreault, Francois
AU - Oukarroum, Abdallah
AU - Melegari, Sílvia Pedroso
AU - Popovic, Radovan
AU - Matias, William Gerson
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by research grants awarded by the CAPES (Proc. n o . 017/2010 ) and CNPq (Proc. n o . 552112/2011-9 ) (Brazil). The authors thank the technical staff at the Faculty for Electron Microscopy Research at McGill University.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2015/11/18
Y1 - 2015/11/18
N2 - With the growth of nanotechnology and widespread use of nanomaterials, there is an increasing risk of environmental contamination by nanomaterials. However, the potential implications of such environmental contamination are hard to evaluate since the toxicity of nanomaterials if often not well characterized. The objective of this study was to evaluate the toxicity of a chromium-based nanoparticle, Cr2O3-NP, used in a wide diversity of industrial processes and commercial products, on the unicellular green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. The deleterious impacts of Cr2O3-NP were characterized using cell density measurements, production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), esterase enzymes activity, and photosystem II electron transport as indicators of toxicity. Cr2O3-NP exposure inhibited culture growth and significantly lowered cellular Chlorophyll a content. From cell density measurements, EC50 values of 2.05 ± 0.20 and 1.35 ± 0.06 g L− 1 Cr2O3-NP were obtained after 24 and 72 h of exposure, respectively. In addition, ROS levels were increased to 160.24 ± 2.47% and 59.91 ± 0.15% of the control value after 24 and 72 h of exposition to 10 g L− 1 Cr2O3-NP. At 24 h of exposure, the esterase activity increased to 160.24% of control value, revealing a modification of the short-term metabolic response of algae to Cr2O3-NP exposure. In conclusion, the metabolism of C. reinhardtii was the most sensitive to Cr2O3-NP after 24 h of treatment.
AB - With the growth of nanotechnology and widespread use of nanomaterials, there is an increasing risk of environmental contamination by nanomaterials. However, the potential implications of such environmental contamination are hard to evaluate since the toxicity of nanomaterials if often not well characterized. The objective of this study was to evaluate the toxicity of a chromium-based nanoparticle, Cr2O3-NP, used in a wide diversity of industrial processes and commercial products, on the unicellular green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. The deleterious impacts of Cr2O3-NP were characterized using cell density measurements, production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), esterase enzymes activity, and photosystem II electron transport as indicators of toxicity. Cr2O3-NP exposure inhibited culture growth and significantly lowered cellular Chlorophyll a content. From cell density measurements, EC50 values of 2.05 ± 0.20 and 1.35 ± 0.06 g L− 1 Cr2O3-NP were obtained after 24 and 72 h of exposure, respectively. In addition, ROS levels were increased to 160.24 ± 2.47% and 59.91 ± 0.15% of the control value after 24 and 72 h of exposition to 10 g L− 1 Cr2O3-NP. At 24 h of exposure, the esterase activity increased to 160.24% of control value, revealing a modification of the short-term metabolic response of algae to Cr2O3-NP exposure. In conclusion, the metabolism of C. reinhardtii was the most sensitive to Cr2O3-NP after 24 h of treatment.
KW - Cell viability
KW - Chlamydomonas reinhardtii
KW - Chromium oxide nanoparticles
KW - Nanotoxicology
KW - Oxidative stress
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U2 - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2016.01.028
DO - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2016.01.028
M3 - Article
C2 - 26803219
AN - SCOPUS:84955295141
SN - 0048-9697
VL - 565
SP - 951
EP - 960
JO - Science of the Total Environment
JF - Science of the Total Environment
ER -