Water-based disease and microbial growth *
Jamie Bartram, Rachel Baum, Peter A. Coclanis, David M. Gute, David Kay, Stéphanie McFadyen, Katherine Pond, William Robertson, Michael J. Rouse in Routledge Handbook of Water and Health, 2015
Cyanobacteria, photosynthetic bacteria and commonly referred to as blue-green algae, grow as blooms or mats, mostly within freshwater bodies, and like dinoflagellates are called harmful algal blooms (HABs). There are a large variety of species. Many of these produce potent toxins that are capable of causing acute and chronic disease in mammals, including humans. The toxins include microcystins, nodularins, anatoxins, saxitoxins, aplysiatoxins, cylindrospremopsins, beta-methyl-amino-l-alanine (BMAA) and lipopolysaccharides (see Table 9.1 in Chapter 9). Algal blooms are more commonly found in eutrophic inland waters (eutrophic waters have a high concentration of nutrients). Human health risks arise if the water is consumed untreated, if people bathe or participate in water contact sports in waters with a scum or heavy bloom and if contaminated water is used in renal dialysis. There have been some notable outbreaks of disease associated with cyanobacterial toxins with a high mortality rate in dialysis patients. The risks through long-term exposure to contaminated drinking water may be greater than occasional recreational exposure to cyanobacterial blooms while bathing in natural waters. More information on cyanobacteria and their toxins are presented in Chapter 9.
Pathophysiology and Management of Shock
Anthony R. Mundy, John M. Fitzpatrick, David E. Neal, Nicholas J. R. George in The Scientific Basis of Urology, 2010
Oxygen was entirely absent from the Earth’s early atmosphere but was produced as a by-product of the photosynthetic activity of marine cyanobacteria. Although there is evidence that cyanobacteria (and eucaria) were present at least 2700 million years ago (MYA) (52), oxygen did not begin to accumulate for a further 250 million years and only reached present day concentrations a further 1850 to 1900 million years later (550–600 MYA).l The oxygenation of earth’s atmosphere appears to have been permissive for metazoan life-forms, and within a geologically short time resulted in the appearance of a multitude of these organisms in the fossil record recognized as the “Cambrian explosion,’’ which started 540 MYA. Today, the vast majority of metazoan organisms rely on oxygen and oxidative phosphorylation to generate their cellular energy. But in the absence of any means of storing this component of the energy supply chain (unlike other substrates), metazoan cells had to develop mechanisms to cope with temporary interruptions to its supply.
11C, 13N, and 15O Tracers
Garimella V. S. Rayudu, Lelio G. Colombetti in Radiotracers for Medical Applications, 2019
Austin and co-workers76 used an enriched isotope, 13C, in the form of amorphous carbon (costing $3.50 per target), and irradiated it with 11 MeV protons at 1 μA to produce about 100 mCi of 13N. The carbon-13 target was then combusted in an automated apparatus and the 13N.N generated was collected in a small volume, having a radioactive concentration of 10 mCi/mi, higher than obtained by other methods. This was needed for their experiments on the metabolism of nitrogen gas by a cyanobacterium.77Both Austin76 and Wieland7 present calculated yields for 13N production using natural and isotopically enriched isotopes as target materials. The calculated yields are often higher than the yields achieved in practice, as quoted in Table 3. This is because of difficulties in recovering all of the generated radioisotope in the desired chemical form.
A multidisciplinary approach to the comparison of three contrasting treatments on both lampenflora community and underlying rock surface
Published in Biofouling, 2023
Rosangela Addesso, Daniela Baldantoni, Beatriz Cubero, José Maria De La Rosa, José Antonio González Pérez, Igor Tiago, Ana Teresa Caldeira, Jo De Waele, Ana Z. Miller
A total of 1,428 OTUs were obtained for the 8 samples for Bacteria, and 467 OTUs for Eukaryotes. The major phylum in the bacterial community of the bare control surface (Figure 5A) was the Cyanobacteria (41.2%) dominated by the class Cyanophyceae (41.2%) (Figure 5B) and the order Nostocales (39.3%) (Figure 5C). This was followed by the phylum Proteobacteria (36.0%), dominated by Alpha- (15.1%), Beta- (8.8%) and Gamma-proteobacteria (8.6%) classes (Figure 5B). Members belonging to the phyla Acidobacteria (5.0%), Bacteroidetes (3.3%), Actinobacteria (2.4%), Firmicutes (2.1%), Nitrospirae (1.5%) and unclassified phyla (6.0%) were also detected (Figure 5A). The control samples from the surface with vermiculations (Figure 5A) exhibited a bacterial composition similar to the bare surface, with phylum Proteobacteria (59.8%), dominated by the classes Gamma- (24.7%), Beta- (24.7%) and Alpha-proteobacteria (7.1%) (Figure 5B), followed by unclassified Bacteria (9.9%) and several phyla: Firmicutes (9.0%), Nitrospirae (5.4%), Bacteroidetes (4.8%), Acidobacteria (3.3%), Actinobacteria (2.8%), Chloroflexi (1.8%), and Gemmatimonadetes (1.2%). Members of the phylum Cyanobacteria were detected with a relative abundance of 0.4%.
Cyanotoxin genotoxicity: a review
Published in Toxin Reviews, 2022
Serkan Yilmaz, Taha Gökmen Ülger, Bayram Göktaş, Şahlan Öztürk, Duygu Öztaş Karataş, Ebru Beyzi
Cyanobacteria, which can also be named under different names, such as cyanoprocaryotes, cyanophytes and blue-green algae, are prokaryotic organisms without real nuclei and plastids, they differ from other algae groups due to their prokaryotic structure, and they have common features with other algae due to their photosynthesis (Palinska and Surosz 2014). Approximately 2000 strains of cyanobacteria belonging to approximately 150 specıes have been identified on earth, and these strains can be found colonially in all kinds of habitats from seas, soil, hot waters to cold surfaces (Pulz and Gross 2004). Cyanobacteria, which have important ecological roles in the carbon and nitrogen cycles, especially Spirulina, Anabaena, Nostoc and Oscillatoria genus, produce many secondary compounds with peptide, alkaloid and polysaccharide structure (Singh 2016). Though some of the secondary metabolites can be used as therapeutic raw materials because of their antitumor, antifungal and anti-inflammatory effects and siderophores, phytohormones, photoprotective compounds and protease inhibitors (Sinha and Häder 2008), some toxins show negative effects on health due to their hepatotoxic, dermatoxic, neurotoxic, cytotoxic and genotoxic effects (De La Cruz et al. 2020). To date, up to 40 cyanobacterial strains have been identified as generating potential cyanotoxin production in surface water and the main strains in this group are Anabaena, Aphanizomenon, Microcystis, Nodularia and Cylindrospermopsis (Cirés et al. 2017).
An overview on cyanobacterial blooms and toxins production: their occurrence and influencing factors
Published in Toxin Reviews, 2022
Isaac Yaw Massey, Muwaffak Al osman, Fei Yang
It is well established that nitrogen fixation is an important feature of some cyanobacteria species and in terms of nutrition nitrogen-fixing, cyanobacteria are considered the most self-sufficient among other organisms. They are photoautotrophs that require only light energy, CO2, dinitrogen (N2), water and some minerals (Paerl and Huisman 2009, Paerl and Otten 2013, Paerl et al.2016, 2001). Heterocysts are specialized nitrogen-fixing cells. Heterocysts have thick cell wall, do not pose photosynthetic membrane and are larger, clearer and highly refractive under light microscope appearance. They may occur within the filament of photosynthetic cells or terminally on a filament (Paerl and Huisman 2009, Paerl and Otten 2013, Paerl et al.2016, 2001). Due to the differences in size, shape and location of heterocysts, they form a significant component in species identification. Within the heterocysts, the enzyme nitrogenase reduces molecular nitrogen to ammonia, which is incorporated into the amido group of glutamine. The thickened cell wall enables molecular oxygen to enter the cell, to be reduced (Bryant 1994, Paerl et al.2016, 2001), thus helping to maintain a highly reducing environment within the cell, necessary for nitrogen reduction.
Related Knowledge Centers
- Carotenoid
- Chlorophyll
- Endomembrane System
- Heterotroph
- Photosynthesis
- Photosynthetic Pigment
- Phycobilin
- Gram-Negative Bacteria
- Paraphyly
- Melainabacteria