Histological alterations of ASIAN sea bass (Lates calcarifer, BLOCH) during sublethal cadmium exposure

Abstract

ABSTRACT           The aim of this study was to investigate histological alterations in Asian sea bass (Lates calcarifer, Bloch) after exposed to cadmium in different doses (2, 4, and 6 mg/kg of cadmium) and time courses (24, 48, and 72 h). Histological changes tested were gill, liver, intestine, stomach, and kidney. We found that there were several damages in gill, such as edema, hyperplasia, epithelial lifting, and partial fusion of secondary lamellae, vacuole degeneration, enlargement of sinusoid and necrosis of hepatocytes in liver, the increasing and swelling of goblet cells and cell lesion in stomach and intestine, and degenerations of tubular, melano-macrophage aggregate, an increase of Bowman’s space, vacuole degeneration, and necrotic areas in kidney. The highest degree of injury index exhibited in kidney with significant difference from gill and liver. In addition, at 6 mg/kg cadmium exposure for 72 h, melano-macrophage and pigmented macrophage counting showed the highest value of 170 + 3. In conclusion, we found that histological alterations in Asian sea bass were clearly caused by cadmium exposure depended upon exposure time and dose response