The cytological and molecular investigation of the toxic effects of the herbicide Roundup on Cucumis sativus

Burcu Yüksel ,Melis Karatas,Özlem Aksoy

doi:10.36253/caryologia-951

Abstract

In the current study, it is aimed to investigate the toxic effects of a widely used herbicide Roundup containing active ingredient glyphosate on cucumber (Cucumis sativus) by cytological and molecular investigation. Three different concentrations (0.6%, 1.2% and 2.4%) of Roundup were applied to cucumber for 48 and 72 hours. At the end of the application procedure, the germination percentage, mean root length, mitotic frequency and mitotic abnormalities, RAPD profiles and Genomic template stability (GTS) were determined in root apical meristematic cells. For RAPD PCR analysis 10 RAPD primers were used, 8 of them produced band patterns and it was found that 5 RAPD primers among them produced unique polymorphic band patterns and subsequently were used to produce a total of 24 bands. Observed percentage of polymorphism was 26%. The changes in RAPD profiles after Roundup treatment was included variations as gain and/or loss of bands compared with the control group. Genomic template stability changed in RAPD profiles at various Roundup concentrations.

Highlights

Recent in vivo and in vitro experiments have been reported the impact of chemical groups of pesticides as they are regarded a significant set of environmental pollutants (Khan 2016; Lushchak et al 2018; Alvarez et al 2017)
Roundup includes the glyphosate [N-glycine] as the active ingredient, and is a well-known and popular brand name of a universal, broad-spectrum herbicide manufactured in U.S It is the top selling herbicide in the world at least for 40 years, as well (Ho and Cummins 2010)
In the studies that use RAPD method, the previous research utilized diagnostic analysis by examining the change in band intensity or disappearance and/or appearance of RAPD bands, and the phenetic numerical analysis that would give us ideas about the general genetic mixture of populations, which is labelled as the genetic similarity analysis (Lynch and Milligan 1990; De Wolf et al 2004)

Summary

Introduction

Recent in vivo and in vitro experiments have been reported the impact of chemical groups of pesticides as they are regarded a significant set of environmental pollutants (Khan 2016; Lushchak et al 2018; Alvarez et al 2017). Previous findings about the genotoxicity of the most of the pesticides are rare and the findings of the different studies are inconsistent (Sarath et al 2019). Pesticides enter reaction with various nucleophilic centers of cellular biomolecules, including DNA because of their reactivity and electrophilic behaviours (Benedetti et al 2018; Bolognesi 2003). They can create other more volatile electrophilic products that can either transform cellular components or are digested to some other steadier products. Control and treatment group design studies, qualitatively and quantitative, can elicit the effects of genotoxicity of the pesticides. In the studies that use RAPD method, the previous research utilized diagnostic analysis by examining the change in band intensity or disappearance and/or appearance of RAPD bands, and the phenetic numerical analysis that would give us ideas about the general genetic mixture of populations, which is labelled as the genetic similarity analysis (Lynch and Milligan 1990; De Wolf et al 2004)

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion