Antagonistic developmental cardiotoxicity of fluroxypyr-meptyl and carfentrazone-ethyl in zebrafish embryos via oxidative stress and apoptosis.

Combined exposure to fluroxypyr-meptyl and carfentrazone-ethyl exhibits antagonistic developmental cardiotoxicity in zebrafish embryos, with an LC50 of 0.766 mg/L for their mixture.

• Why it matters: Understanding the toxic effects of pesticide combinations is crucial because they are common in agriculture and residues are detected in aquatic environments, posing ecological risks that are not well characterized.
• What they did: The study used acute toxicity tests, morphological assessments, biochemical analyses, gene expression, and molecular docking to evaluate cardiotoxicity and underlying mechanisms in zebrafish embryos exposed to individual and combined herbicides at specific concentrations.
• The result: Both herbicides, alone and combined, caused developmental impairments, cardiac abnormalities, apoptosis, and oxidative stress, with gene expression and molecular docking indicating disrupted cardiac and apoptotic pathways, informing environmental risk assessments.