2009 Volume 57 Issue 2 Pages 201-209
Because the long-term effects of chemicals on fish can be more important than are short-term effects, the emphasis in fish toxicity analysis has shifted to performing chronic tests, such as early-life-stage (ELS) tests. However, the methodology for toxicity testing of marine fish is less developed than that of freshwater species, and chronic toxicity testing of Japanese marine fish has been complicated by the difficulty of handling fry, especially at early life stages. The acute-to-chronic toxicity ratio (ACR) is used to estimate chronic toxicity from acute toxicity because the ACR for a given toxicant is relatively constant over a range of test species. However, most ACRs have been derived from using American fish species, and whether these data are valid for Japanese species is unknown. To assess the validity of ACRs in Japanese marine fish, we used red sea bream (Pagrus major) and mummichog (Fundulus heteroclitus) in acute and chronic toxicity tests of 4 chemicals: bis-n-tributyltin oxide (TBTO), triphenyltin chloride (TPTC), cadmium (Cd), and naphthalene (Nap). The data revealed that red sea bream were more receptive than mummichog. The ACRs for TBTO, TPTC, Cd, and Nap were similar between the two species (670, 120, 18, and 44 for red sea bream and 430, 61, 31, and 78 for mummichog, respectively). Therefore, we can estimate chronic toxicity values of chemicals for red sea bream, a highly receptive Japanese fish, from existing ACRs for mummichog, an American species.
