Abstract
The present study was carried out to demonstrate novel use of pharmacokinetic approaches to characterize drug behaviors/movements in the vegetables with implications to food safety. The absorption, distribution, metabolism and most importantly, the elimination of tetracycline (TC) and sulfamethoxazole (SMX) in edible plants Brassica rapa chinensis and Ipomoea aquatica grown hydroponically were demonstrated and studied using non-compartmental pharmacokinetic analysis. The results revealed drug-dependent and vegetable-dependent pharmacokinetic differences and indicated that ephemeral vegetables could have high capacity accumulating antibiotics (up to 160 μg g-1 for TC and 38 μg g-1 for SMX) within hours. TC concentration in the root (Cmax) could reach 11 times higher than that in the cultivation fluid and 3–28 times higher than the petioles/stems. Based on the volume of distribution (Vss), SMX was 3–6 times more extensively distributed than TC. Both antibiotics showed evident, albeit slow elimination phase with elimination half-lives ranging from 22 to 88 hours. For the first time drug elimination through the roots of a plant was demonstrated, and by viewing the root as a central compartment and continuous infusion without a loading dose as drug administration mode, it is possible to pharmacokinetically monitor the movement of antibiotics and their fate in the vegetables with more detailed information not previously available. Phyto-pharmacokinetic could be a new area worth developing new models for the assessment of veterinary drugs in edible plants.
Highlights
Antibiotic drugs have long been used for the treatment or prophylaxis of bacterial infections in humans and non-human species
There is substantial variation in the manner in which antibiotics are eliminated by different animal species, it is estimated that a significant fraction (30–90%) of the total dose of administered antibiotics are excreted in feces or urine as either the parent drug or metabolites [1]
Preliminary studies revealed that the absorption and distribution profiles of both antibiotics in B. rapa chinensis were similar at three concentrations (1, 10 and 100 μg mL-1), so the highest concentration (100 μg mL-1) was used for follow-up experiments
Summary
Antibiotic drugs have long been used for the treatment or prophylaxis of bacterial infections in humans and non-human species. Since some drugs are chemically stable and can persist within the environment for relatively long periods of time, there is an added risk of drug accumulation by plants that are grown on heavily contaminated soils or watered with contaminated water sources [1,6,10]. Such accumulation in edible plants poses an unknown health risk to individuals who consume such plants
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