Marumoto Masumi, Sakamoto Mineshi, Marumoto Kohji, Tsuruta Shozo, Komohara Yoshihiro
National Institute for Minamata Disease, 4058-18, Hama, Minamata, Kumamoto 867-0008, Japan.
Department of Dental Material Science, School of Dentistry, Aichi Gakuin University, 1-100 Kusumoto-cho, Chikusa-ku, Nagoya, Aichi 464-8650, Japan.
Acta Histochem Cytochem. 2020 Dec 25;53(6):147-155. doi: 10.1267/ahc.20-00009. Epub 2020 Dec 19.
Minamata disease is a methylmercury poisoning caused by consumption of marine food contaminated by man-made methylmercury environmental pollution, and its most prominent feature is marked pathological changes in the central nervous system. Morphological alterations are less pronounced in the liver and the kidney, although their mercury levels are higher than those of the brain. In marine mammals, methylmercury is known to be easily converted to inorganic mercury and it combines with selenium forming mercury selenide, which may counteract the toxicity of mercury. However, little is known about the formation of mercury and selenium complex in human organs. In the present study, we examined the cerebrum, cerebellum, liver, and kidney of a Minamata disease case to study the mercury and selenium localization using electron probe microanalysis. Our results indicated the mercury and selenium localization in the specified tissue of the brain, liver, and kidney such as glial cells, Kupffer cells, and renal tubules.
水俣病是一种因食用受人为甲基汞环境污染而被污染的海产品所致的甲基汞中毒，其最显著的特征是中枢神经系统出现明显的病理变化。肝脏和肾脏中的形态学改变不太明显，尽管它们的汞含量高于大脑。在海洋哺乳动物中，已知甲基汞很容易转化为无机汞，并与硒结合形成硒化汞，这可能会抵消汞的毒性。然而，关于人体器官中汞和硒复合物的形成知之甚少。在本研究中，我们检查了一例水俣病患者的大脑、小脑、肝脏和肾脏，使用电子探针微量分析来研究汞和硒的定位。我们的结果表明，汞和硒定位于大脑、肝脏和肾脏的特定组织中，如神经胶质细胞、库普弗细胞和肾小管。
