Graduate Institute of Molecular and Comparative Pathobiology, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC.
Department of Oceanography and Asia-Pacific Ocean Research Center, National Sun Yat-sen University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, ROC.
Environ Pollut. 2018 Apr;235:534-545. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2018.01.010. Epub 2018 Jan 9.
Silver, such as silver nanoparticles (AgNPs), has been widely used in commercial products and may be released into the environment. The interaction between Ag deposition and biological systems is raising serious concerns because of one health consideration. Cetaceans, as the top predators of the oceans, may be exposed to Ag/Ag compounds and suffer negative health impacts from the deposition of these compounds in their bodies. In the present study, we utilized autometallography (AMG) to localize the Ag in the liver and kidney tissues of cetaceans and developed a model called the cetacean histological Ag assay (CHAA) to estimate the Ag concentrations in the liver and kidney tissues of cetaceans. Our results revealed that Ag was mainly located in hepatocytes, Kupffer cells and the epithelial cells of some proximal renal tubules. The tissue pattern of Ag/Ag compounds deposition in cetaceans was different from those in previous studies conducted on laboratory rats. This difference may suggest that cetaceans have a different metabolic profile of Ag, so a presumptive metabolic pathway of Ag in cetaceans is advanced. Furthermore, our results suggest that the Ag contamination in cetaceans living in the North-western Pacific Ocean is more severe than that in cetaceans living in other marine regions of the world. The level of Ag deposition in cetaceans living in the former area may have caused negative impacts on their health condition. Further investigations are warranted to study the systemic Ag distribution, the cause of death/stranding, and the infectious diseases in stranded cetaceans with different Ag concentrations for comprehensively evaluating the negative health effects caused by Ag in cetaceans.
银，如纳米银颗粒（AgNPs），已被广泛应用于商业产品中，并可能释放到环境中。由于对一个健康因素的考虑，Ag 沉积与生物系统的相互作用引起了人们的严重关注。鲸目动物作为海洋的顶级掠食者，可能会接触到 Ag/Ag 化合物，并因这些化合物在其体内的沉积而遭受负面健康影响。在本研究中，我们利用自动金属染色（AMG）来定位鲸目动物肝脏和肾脏组织中的 Ag，并开发了一种称为鲸目动物组织 Ag 分析（CHAA）的模型，以估计鲸目动物肝脏和肾脏组织中的 Ag 浓度。我们的结果表明，Ag 主要位于肝细胞、枯否细胞和某些近端肾小管的上皮细胞中。Ag/Ag 化合物在鲸目动物组织中的沉积模式与之前在实验室大鼠上进行的研究不同。这种差异可能表明鲸目动物对 Ag 的代谢模式不同，因此提出了一种鲸目动物中 Ag 的推定代谢途径。此外，我们的结果表明，生活在西北太平洋的鲸目动物中的 Ag 污染比生活在世界其他海洋区域的鲸目动物更为严重。生活在前者区域的鲸目动物中 Ag 的沉积水平可能已经对其健康状况造成了负面影响。需要进一步调查以研究具有不同 Ag 浓度的搁浅鲸目动物的全身 Ag 分布、死亡/搁浅原因和传染病，以全面评估 Ag 对鲸目动物造成的负面健康影响。
