Zebrafish embryo microarrays after 48 hour and 96 hour exposure intervals to the Deepwater Horizon oil emulsions that reached the GoM shoreline.

Zebrafish embryos/larvae are a choice model system for studying early stages of vertebrate development and how these stages can be perturbed by environmental stressors. Petrochemical combustion products elicit developmental toxicity that is associated with transcriptome changes in zebrafish embryos (ZFE). We used microarrays to characterize transcriptome changes in ZFE that had been exposed in the laboratory to oil emulsions collected from the GoM shoreline, ~9 weeks after the Deepwater Horizon blowout. ZFE were exposed to oil emulsions collected (July 1-4, 2010) at the GoM shoreline. ZFE were exposed to emulsions, consisting of varying amounts of alkanes, polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), sand and seawater that had been “buttered” on the bottom of cups, in which ZFE were suspended in zebrafish medium. ZFE development was monitored by light microscopy. Control ZFE were suspended in zebrafish medium without emulsions. Gross developmental abnormalities, including axial changes, altered swimming patterns and yolk sac and pericardial sac swelling were noted and photographed. ZFE/larvae were collected after exposures ended, and placed in clean medium until 192 hr post-fertilization, when larvae were collected for RNA extraction and hybridization on Affymetrix zebrafish microarrays.