Trifluralin (alpha,alpha,alpha-trifluoro-2,6-dinitro-N,N-dipropyl-p-toluidine; TFL) is a pre-emergence, soil-incorporated herbicide that has been in agricultural use since the early 1960s and is moderately persistent in soil. The purpose of this study was to isolate and characterise TFL-resistant bacteria from a soil in which this pesticide has been used for the last four decades and to determine their ability to degrade TFL using HPLC. Eight bacteria were isolated by repeated subculture in liquid medium with TFL as carbon source and a ninth (isolate 9) from growth around TFL crystals on solid medium. The bacteria from enriched liquid culture were identified by biochemical tests and 16S rDNA sequencing. In a mineral salts medium with 0.1% succinate, 0.1% yeast extract and 50 mg l(-1) TFL, reductions in the level of pesticide of 24.6% for Klebsiella sp., 16.4% for Herbaspirillum sp., 25.0% and 16.0% for two strains of Bacillus sp. and 21.0% for unidentified isolate number 9 were obtained after 30 days. These were similar to the level obtained using a known TFL-degrading bacterium, Brevundimonas diminuta (NCIMB 10329). Three Pseudomonas sp. and one Bacillus sp. reduced levels by less than 5%. The five positive isolates can be used to study the biochemical and molecular biology of TFL biodegradation with the aim of optimising the degradative ability of one or more of the isolates for future use in bioremediation processes.
The effect of dietary diphenyl diselenide (1 ppm) on N-nitroso-N-methylurea (NMU)-induced mammary carcinogenesis was examined in female Wistar rats. Beginning at 5 weeks of age, the animals were fed with either control or diphenyl-diselenide-supplied diets until the end of the study (210 days). At 50 days of age, mammary tumor was induced by the administration of three doses of NMU (50 mg/kg body wt, intraperitoneally) once a week for 3 weeks. In experimental trials, latency to tumor onset was extended in rats fed with diet supplemented with diphenyl diselenide (P < 0.05). The incidence and frequency of tumors were significantly small in animals supplemented with diphenyl diselenide. However, the multiplicity of tumors was not altered by dietary diphenyl diselenide. Diphenyl diselenide supplementation also restored superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity and vitamin C levels altered in the NMU group (P < 0.05). Our results suggest that diphenyl diselenide can be considered a chemopreventive agent, even when supplemented at a relatively low concentration.
Trifluralin (alpha,alpha,alpha-trifluoro-2,6-dinitro-N,N-dipropyl-p-toluidine) is a dinitroaniline compound which was first produced in the 1960s and has been used extensively as an agricultural herbicide. There are a few publications on the biodegradation of this xenobiotic compound, but to our knowledge nothing has been documented on the genetic aspects of its catabolism. In this article, we report the analysis of DNA isolated from bacteria previously shown to degrade trifluralin, using as probes the catabolic genes ndoB, todC, xyIX, catA and xyIE which encode the enzymes naphthalene 1,2-dioxygenase, toluene dioxygenase, toluate 1,2-dioxygenase, catechol 1,2-dioxygenase and catechol 2,3-dioxygenase respectively. Using PCR and hybridization analysis, the strong hybridization of the ndoB gene with DNA extracted from four trifluralin-degrading isolates was demonstrated, although none of them was able to degrade naphthalene, as indicated by the 'clear zone' test. The results indicated the presence in these bacteria of a dioxygenase gene, whose product could act on trifluralin as its principal substrate, or fortuitously, by cometabolism. This is the first publication on genes in trifluralin-degrading bacteria.
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