Selenium mercury toxicity

Interactions Overabundance of one trace element can interfere with the metabolic use of another element available at normal levels. For example, addition of large amounts of zinc to a diet interferes with (antagonizes) intestinal copper absorption, resulting in copper deficiency from a diet with adequate copper content. Copper deficiency can provoke iron deficiency and anaemia. Molybdenum deficiency in animals can be induced by co-administration of large amounts of the similar element tungsten. Iron deficiency can also increase retention of cadmium and lead, and selenium has been proposed to protect against cadmium and mercury toxicity. 

Antagonism The effect of mixture is less than that estimated for additivity on the basis of the toxici-ties of the components. The protection against mercury toxicity by selenium is a typical example of this category. This group is further classified into inhibition - a component does not have effect and decreases the effect of another component or other components and masking - one component overrides the effect of other. 

Sugiura, Y., Y. Hojo, Y. Tamai, and H. Tanaka. 1976. Selenium protection against mercury toxicity. Binding of methylmercury by the selenohydryl-containing ligand.. Amer. Chem. 98 2339-2341. 

Lindh U and Johansson E (1987) Protective effects of selenium against mercury toxicity as studied in the rat liver and kidney by nuclear analytical techniques. 

Mercury accumulation in viscera of euphausiids Meganyctiphanes norvegica) was decreased by moderate concentrations of selenium (10.0-1000.0 xg Se/L) in the medium. In studies with larvae of the Dungeness crab (Cancer magister), selenium concentrations of 10.0-1000.0 p,g/L tended to decrease mercury toxicity however, high levels of selenium (>5000.0 p-g/L) increased mercury toxicity. 

Welsh, S. O., and Soares, J. H., 1976, The protective effect of vitamin E and selenium against methyl mercury toxicity in the Japanese quail, Nutr. Rep. Int. 13 43. 

Alexander, J., Hostmark, A. T., Forre, 0., and von Kraemer Bryn, M., 1979, The influence of selenium on methyl mercury toxicity in rat hepatoma cells, human embryonic fibroblasts and human lymphocytes in culture, Acta pharmacol. et toxicol. 45 379. 

Johnson, S. L., and Pond, W. G., 1974, Inorganic vs. organic mercury toxicity in growing rats protection by dietary selenium but not zinc, Nutr. Repts. Internet. 

Welsh SO, Soares JH (1973) Serum transaminase levels and the interacting effect of selenium and vitamin E in mercury toxicity. FEd. Proc. 32 261 (abstr.)... 

Mercury Toxicity Reduced by Selenium," Nutrition Reviews, Vol. 31,1973, p. 25. 

Toxic inorganic substances e.g. Lead, manganese, cadmium, antimony, beryllium, mercury arsenic phosphorus selenium and sulphur compounds, fluorides. 

The most common toxic metals in industrial use are cadmium, chromium, lead, silver, and mercury less commonly used are arsenic, selenium (both metalloids), and barium. Cadmium, a metal commonly used in alloys and myriads of other industrial uses, is fairly mobile in the environment and is responsible for many maladies including renal failure and a degenerative bone disease called "ITA ITA" disease. Chromium, most often found in plating wastes, is also environmentally mobile and is most toxic in the Cr valence state. Lead has been historically used as a component of an antiknock compound in gasoline and, along with chromium (as lead chromate), in paint and pigments. 

A waste is toxic under 40 CFR Part 261 if the extract from a sample of the waste exceeds specified limits for any one of eight elements and five pesticides (arsenic, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury, selenium, silver, endrin, methoxychlor, toxaphene, 2,4-D and 2,4,5-TP Silvex using extraction procedure (EP) toxicity test methods. Note that this narrow definition of toxicity relates to whether a waste is defined as hazardous for regulatory purposes in the context of this chapter, toxicity has a broader meaning because most deep-well-injected wastes have properties that can be toxic to living organisms. 

Inorganic elements can be broadly classified as metals and nonmetals. Most metallic elements become toxic at some concentration. Nine elements (arsenic, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury, nickel, selenium, and thallium) and cyanide are defined as hazardous inorganics for the purposes of deep-well injection. 

Glickstein, N. 1978. Acute toxicity of mercury and selenium to Crassostrea gigas embryos and Cancer magister larvae. Mar. Biol. 49 113-117. 

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