Department of Physics and Materials Science, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, People's Republic of China.
Environ Sci Technol. 2012 Jan 3;46(1):226-31. doi: 10.1021/es2016928. Epub 2011 Dec 7.
We report data demonstrating that zebrafish embryos irradiated by α-particles can release a stress signal into the water, which can be communicated to the unirradiated zebrafish embryos sharing the same water medium, and then these unirradiated zebrafish embryos can release a feedback stress signal back to the irradiated embryos. The effects of radiation on the whole embryos were studied through quantification of apoptotic signals at 24 h post fertilization through staining with the vital dye acridine orange, followed by counting the stained cells under a microscope. We refer to this phenomenon as the "rescue effect", where the unirradiated embryos successfully helped the irradiated embryos mitigate the radiation induced DNA damages. The results showed that the number of apoptotic signals in the irradiated embryos was smaller when they were partnered with bystander unirradiated embryos in the same medium. The results also showed significantly fewer apoptotic signals in the irradiated embryos when the population of bystander embryos increased from 10 to 30, while keeping the population of irradiated embryos at 10. These data suggest that the stress communicated between the unirradiated zebrafish embryos and the irradiated embryos sharing the same medium will help "rescue" the irradiated embryos, and that the strength of the rescue effect depends on the number of rescuing bystander unirradiated embryos.
我们报告的数据表明，α 粒子辐照的斑马鱼胚胎可以向水中释放应激信号，这些信号可以被共享同一水介质的未辐照斑马鱼胚胎传递，然后这些未辐照的斑马鱼胚胎可以向辐照胚胎释放反馈应激信号。通过用吖啶橙对受精后 24 小时进行染色，然后在显微镜下计算染色细胞的数量，研究了辐射对整个胚胎的影响，以定量检测凋亡信号。我们将这种现象称为“拯救效应”，其中未辐照的胚胎成功帮助辐照的胚胎减轻了辐射引起的 DNA 损伤。结果表明，当辐照胚胎与同一介质中的旁观者未辐照胚胎配对时，辐照胚胎中的凋亡信号数量较少。当旁观者胚胎的数量从 10 增加到 30 时，同时保持辐照胚胎的数量为 10，辐照胚胎中的凋亡信号数量也显著减少。这些数据表明，未辐照的斑马鱼胚胎和共享同一介质的辐照胚胎之间传递的应激信号将有助于“拯救”辐照胚胎，并且拯救效应的强度取决于拯救旁观者未辐照胚胎的数量。
