Pais-Roldán Patricia, Singh Ajeet Pratap, Schulz Hildegard, Yu Xin
High Field Magnetic Resonance Department, Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, 72076, Germany.
IMPRS for Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience, Tübingen, 72076, Germany.
Sci Rep. 2016 Apr 11;6:24151. doi: 10.1038/srep24151.
Magnetoreception in animals illustrates the interaction of biological systems with the geomagnetic field (geoMF). However, there are few studies that identified the impact of high magnetic field (MF) exposure from Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scanners (>100,000 times of geoMF) on specific biological targets. Here, we investigated the effects of a 14 Tesla MRI scanner on zebrafish larvae. All zebrafish larvae aligned parallel to the B0 field, i.e. the static MF, in the MRI scanner. The two otoliths (ear stones) in the otic vesicles of zebrafish larvae older than 24 hours post fertilization (hpf) fused together after the high MF exposure as short as 2 hours, yielding a single-otolith phenotype with aberrant swimming behavior. The otolith fusion was blocked in zebrafish larvae under anesthesia or embedded in agarose. Hair cells may play an important role on the MF-induced otolith fusion. This work provided direct evidence to show that high MF interacts with the otic vesicle of zebrafish larvae and causes otolith fusion in an "all-or-none" manner. The MF-induced otolith fusion may facilitate the searching for MF sensors using genetically amenable vertebrate animal models, such as zebrafish.
动物的磁感受体现了生物系统与地磁场（geoMF）之间的相互作用。然而，很少有研究确定磁共振成像（MRI）扫描仪产生的强磁场（MF）暴露（>地磁场的100,000倍）对特定生物靶点的影响。在此，我们研究了14特斯拉MRI扫描仪对斑马鱼幼体的影响。所有斑马鱼幼体在MRI扫描仪中与B0场（即静磁场）平行排列。受精后24小时（hpf）以上的斑马鱼幼体耳囊中，两个耳石（耳内结石）在短至2小时的强磁场暴露后融合在一起，产生具有异常游泳行为的单耳石表型。在麻醉的斑马鱼幼体或嵌入琼脂糖的斑马鱼幼体中，耳石融合被阻断。毛细胞可能在磁场诱导的耳石融合中起重要作用。这项工作提供了直接证据，表明强磁场与斑马鱼幼体的耳囊相互作用，并以“全或无”的方式导致耳石融合。磁场诱导的耳石融合可能有助于利用基因易操作的脊椎动物动物模型（如斑马鱼）寻找磁传感器。
