%0 Journal Article
%T Microbiological and Toxicological Assessment of Pharmaceutical Wastewater from the Lagos Megacity, Nigeria
%A Avemaria Ifeoma Obasi
%A Nnamdi Henry Amaeze
%A Damilola Dorcas Osoko
%J Chinese Journal of Biology
%D 2014
%R 10.1155/2014/638142
%X We conducted a microbiological and toxicological profiling of a pharmaceutical wastewater, one of the major wastes entering the Lagos lagoon. The morphological characterization of seven bacterial isolates from the wastewater indicated that 4 of them were gram positive bacilli while 3 were cocci of both gram reactions. The bacterial isolates exhibited varying degrees of enzyme activities but most were able to hydrolyze starch to yield amylase. Only 3 of the isolates showed prospects as antibacterial agents, given their moderate inhibition to Staphylococcus xylosus relative to 8 other species tested. Overall, 81.3% of the isolates were resistant, and 3.3% were susceptible while 15.4% of the isolates showed intermediate sensitivity to the antibiotics. The assessment of antioxidant activities in liver samples of Nile tilapia, Oreochromis niloticus, exposed to sublethal concentrations of the effluents indicated some form of oxidative stress given the higher levels of lipid peroxidation product, malondialdehyde, in the exposed fishes relative to the control kept in dechlorinate tap water. But for reduced glutathione, activities of the antioxidative stress enzymes, superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT), and glutathione-s-transferase (GST), were higher in the effluent exposed tilapia. Responses were not dose dependent and enzyme activities were often higher at day 14 compared to day 28. This relevance of the findings to water quality was discussed. 1. Introduction The fate of pharmaceutical effluents in aquatic environments is increasingly eliciting scientific inquiry owing to recent findings of their effects in biological systems [1]. Nigeria has a few pharmaceutical companies most of which are situated in Ogun and Lagos States in the country¡¯s south western region, discharging effluents into neighbouring rivers, creeks, and lagoons. Pharmaceutical effluents are wastes generated by pharmaceutical industries during the process of drug manufacturing [2]. These wastes by virtue of their source are composed of a variety of biologically active chemical components including antibiotics, lipid regulators, anti-inflammatories, antiepileptics, tranquilizers, oil and grease [3], heavy metals [4], and myriads of other compounds depending on the drug or personal care products being manufactured. Pharmaceutical effluents particularly those rich in contraceptives have also been linked with endocrine disrupting effects [5]. Microbial actions on effluents often result in products which may also interfere with endocrine functions. Mycobacterium smegmatis is known to
%U http://www.hindawi.com/journals/cjb/2014/638142/