Acute Toxicity Evaluation of the Disinfectant Containing Percarbonate and Tetraacetylethylenediamine by Measuring Behavioral Responses of Small Fish Using Image Analysis

Disinfectants containing percarbonate and tetraacetylethylenediamine (TAED) has been developed as an effective and relatively safe disinfectant to destroy viruses and bacteria in animals and humans, however it is known that most disinfectants can cause danger to living organisms including humans. In the current study, acute toxicity of the disinfectant composed of percarbonate and TAED was assessed by measuring behavioral responses as well as lethal concentrations of aquatic organisms such as medaka and zebrafish when they were exposed to it. First, the breeding water properties were determined by measuring dissolved oxygen (DO) and pH changes over time up to 96 h in acute toxicity tests using the medaka, and the lethal concentration 50% (LC50, 88.39 ppm) was calculated using the lethality rate of the fish. This experiment was conducted in compliance with traditional OECD guidelines. Second, the assessment of behavioral responses (locomotive activity and swimming speed) with the zebrafish were assessed by the image analysis to capture the images per second for three hours, and the collected data were processed using image analysis to calculate the locomotive activity and swimming speed. Finally, the LC50 (135.76 ppm) of the disinfectant to the fish was also measured after three hours. Overall, the data revealed that LC50 of the disinfectant may be affected by the pH of the water exposed to the disinfectant, not by the DO in the water. In addition, the results from the image analysis indicated that the behavioral responses of the fish can further assess the acute toxicity of the disinfectant at concentrations below the LC50 and there was a relationship (R(2) = 0.85) between the behavioral responses and the survival rate of the fish. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL (ESM): The online version of this article (doi: 10.1007/s12257-021-0419-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.