Host: The Japanese Society of Toxicology
Name : The 51st Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society of Toxicology
Date : July 03, 2024 - July 05, 2024
Lead poisoning in wild birds in Japan is still a serious unresolved environmental pollution problem, and the Ministry of the Environment, Japan has issued guidelines to enforce lead ammunition regulations nationwide from 2025 with the aim of eradicating lead poisoning by 2030, but monitoring data on lead concentrations nationwide are lacking. It is essential to investigate the current state of contamination and sources of exposure for effective regulation. It is also necessary to elucidate the mechanisms of species differences in order to predict and prioritize highly sensitive bird species for control.
So far, our research has been concerned with monitoring the contamination status of lead contamination/poisoning and elucidating the sources and routes of contamination. In addition to lead concentration measurements, we are also conducting lead isotope measurements to estimate the source of lead contamination. We also try to analyze species differences in the inhibition rate of the target enzyme ALAD (aminolevulinic acid dehydratase), known as a sensitive biomarker of lead-induced haematotoxicity, lead distribution in organs using laser-assisted inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS), to analyze fecal microbiome alterations to elucidate the in-direct toxic effects of lead exposure. In this presentation, we would like to give an overview of the above-mentioned research results and future perspectives.
