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Imposex in Thais gradata as a Biomarker for TBT Contamination on the Southern Coast of Peninsular Malaysia

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Abstract

Thais gradata samples were collected from six locations along the southern shores of Peninsular Malaysia and analyzed for imposex incidence and organotin (butyltins (BTs), including tributyltin, dibutyltin, and monobutyltin, and phenyltins (PTs), including triphenyltin, diphenyltin, and monophenyltin concentrations), in tissue burden. On average, the BT levels were found to be higher than the levels reported a year before for other biota. In contrast, the PT compounds were found to be lower than in the previous report. The present study also classified the morphological expressions of the imposex scheme for this species into seven stages (stage 0 to stage 6) by observing the development of vas deference sequence (VDS) and penis bulk. This latest imposex scheme clearly indicates the mechanism of VDS growth, the structural changes from penis bulk to a penis with flagellum, and from a normal vaginal opening to a swollen vaginal opening. The degree of imposex was assessed using the vas deference sequence index and the percentage of females possessing the imposex characteristics. It was found that locations possessing high imposex levels also tended to show high BT levels in the snail tissue samples. However, correlation analysis did not show a significant relationship among the two parameters. A better result could be obtained if more samples and sampling locations were added in order to prove the hypothesis. The nonsignificant correlation between the shell height and any of the organotin compounds, along with no significant differences between BT levels in female and lower imposex stage samples, suggests that the BT concentration detected was a recent contamination.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Buhari, Faradiella, Shahrizad, Zulfa Hanan, and Zairi for their assistance with the field sampling. We are grateful to Professor Tsuguo Otake and Mrs. Masako Hara for their considerable assistance during the SEM procedure. This work was supported in part by Grants-in-Aid no. 18780141 and 20688008 from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of Japan and was cofinanced by eScienceFund grant no. 06-01-04-SF0715 from the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (MOSTI), Malaysia.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. International Coastal Research Center, Ocean Research Institute, University of Tokyo, 2-106-1, Akahama, Ōtsuchi, Iwate, 028-1102, Japan

    Ferdaus Mohamat-Yusuff & Takaomi Arai

  2. Department of Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Environmental Studies, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia

    Ferdaus Mohamat-Yusuff & Mohd Kamil Yusoff

  3. Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia

    Syaizwan Zahmir Zulkifli & Ahmad Ismail

  4. Department of Biosphere Sciences, School of Human Sciences, Kobe College, 4-1, Okadayama, Nishinomiya, Hyogo, 662-8505, Japan

    Hiroya Harino

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  1. Ferdaus Mohamat-Yusuff
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  2. Syaizwan Zahmir Zulkifli
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  3. Ahmad Ismail
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Correspondence to Ferdaus Mohamat-Yusuff.

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Mohamat-Yusuff, F., Zulkifli, S.Z., Ismail, A. et al. Imposex in Thais gradata as a Biomarker for TBT Contamination on the Southern Coast of Peninsular Malaysia. Water Air Soil Pollut 211, 443–457 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-009-0314-3

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