Safety of photosynthetic Synechococcus elongatus for in vivo cyanobacteria–mammalian symbiotic therapeutics

The cyanobacterium Synechococcus elongatus (SE) has been shown to rescue ischaemic heart muscle after myocardial infarction by photosynthetic oxygen production. Here, we investigated SE toxicity and hypothesized that systemic SE exposure does not elicit a significant immune response in rats. Wistar rats intravenously received SE (n = 12), sterile saline (n = 12) or E. coli lipopolysaccharide (LPS, n = 4), and a subset (8 SE, 8 saline) received a repeat injection 4 weeks later. At baseline, 4 h, 24 h, 48 h, 8 days and 4 weeks after injection, clinical assessments, blood cultures, blood counts, lymphocyte phenotypes, liver function tests, proinflammatory cytokines and immunoglobulins were assessed. Across all metrics, SE rats responded comparably to saline controls, displaying no clinically significant immune response. As expected, LPS rats exhibited severe immunological responses. Systemic SE administration does not induce sepsis or toxicity in rats, thereby supporting the safety of cyanobacteria–mammalian symbiotic therapeutics using this organism.