Centre of Marine Sciences (CCMAR/CIMAR LA), University of Algarve, Campus de Gambelas, 8005-139 Faro, Portugal.
Energy and Environment Institute, School of Environmental Sciences, University of Hull, Hull HU6 7RX, UK.
Mar Drugs. 2023 May 25;21(6):320. doi: 10.3390/md21060320.
Tetrodotoxin (TTX) and its analogues are naturally occurring toxins historically responsible for human poisoning fatalities in Eastern Asia. It is typically linked to the consumption of pufferfish and, to a lesser extent, marine gastropods and crabs. In the scope of a comprehensive project to understand the prevalence of emergent toxins in edible marine organisms, we report, for the first time, the detection of TTX analogues in the soft tissues of edible crabs, the European fiddler crab ) and green crab (), harvested in southern Portugal. No TTX was detected in the analyzed samples. However, three TTX analogues were detected-an unknown TTX epimer, deoxyTTX, and trideoxyTTX. These three analogues were found in the European fiddler crab while only trideoxyTTX was found in the green crab, suggesting that the accumulation of TTX analogues might be influenced by the crabs' different feeding ecology. These results highlight the need to widely monitor TTX and its analogues in edible marine species in order to provide adequate information to the European Food Safety Authority and to protect consumers.
河豚毒素（TTX）及其类似物是天然存在的毒素，历史上曾导致东亚地区人类中毒死亡。这些毒素通常与食用河豚鱼有关，在较小程度上也与海洋腹足类动物和螃蟹有关。在全面了解食用海洋生物中新兴毒素的流行情况的项目范围内，我们首次报告了在葡萄牙南部收获的可食用螃蟹（欧洲招潮蟹和青蟹）的软组织中检测到 TTX 类似物。在所分析的样本中未检测到 TTX。然而，检测到了三种 TTX 类似物——一种未知的 TTX 差向异构体、脱氧 TTX 和去氧三氧甲苯。这三种类似物在欧洲招潮蟹中发现，而在青蟹中仅发现了 trideoxyTTX，这表明 TTX 类似物的积累可能受到螃蟹不同的摄食生态的影响。这些结果强调需要广泛监测食用海洋物种中的 TTX 及其类似物，以便向欧洲食品安全局提供充分的信息并保护消费者。
