Molluscicidal activity of sodium hypochlorite against snails: Immunological and hepato-endocrine alterations with in silico docking study.

Schistosomiasis is a tropical disease that widely neglected. reproduce asexually within the freshwater snail, Sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl) is a widely used disinfectant, so its effect against gainst snails was evaluated. The present results showed that NaOCl has a molluscicidal activity against adult snails at LC 1.25 ppm. Hemocytes displayed varied morphological forms after being exposed to the LC10 and LC25 concentrations of NaOCl in snails, and the phagocytic index of snail's hemocytes significantly increased. The phagocytic potency of exposed hemocytes to charcoal showed ruptured plasma membrane, engulfed particles, vacuolation in the cytoplasm and degeneration of nuclei. When snails were treated with sublethal concentrations of NaOCl, transaminases (AST & ALT), alkaline and acid phosphatase activities were significantly increased. In contrast, the total protein, albumin concentrations, Testosterone (T) and 17β Estradiol (E) showed a significant decrease ( ≤ 0.05) as compared to the control groups. The molecular docking interaction showed high efficiency for the ligand, NaOCl against the receptor binding sites of the acid phosphatase, alanine aminotransferase, estrogen and testosterone. The present results showed that NaOCl could be used as an effective molluscicide against snails but more attention should be paid to investigate the side effects on the non-target organisms living in the freshwater environment.