Study on acute toxicity and structure-activity relationship of zebrafish (Danio rerio) exposed to naphthoquinones

Abstract

In this paper, we evaluated the acute toxicity of five naphthoquinone compounds, expressed as median lethal concentration at 96 h (LC₅₀) using zebrafish as a model. The five compounds were classified as harmful or very toxic. The Gaussian method was used to calculate the quantitative-chemical parameters of each compound. Based on the structure-activity relationship analysis, the interaction between the naphthoquinones and the target is likely mediated by 1-carbonyl and the hydrophobic fraction substituted in α -position of naphthoquinone via hydrogen bonding and hydrophobic interactions. Our results provide a foundation for evaluating the aquatic ecological risk and the mode of action of naphthoquinones in the environment.

Keywords:

• Zebrafish
• naphthoquinones
• structure-activity relationship
• toxicity

Acknowledgments

We acknowledge the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 30800934 and No. 30771771) for financial support.