Table 3.

Summary of nephrotoxicity of pure microcystin-LR in mammalian studies in vivo.

Test Organism/System	Exposure	Concentration/Dose	Time Point	Toxic Effects	References
SD rats	I.P.	20, 40, 80, 120, 160, 180, 200, or 400 μg/kg	1, 12, 24 h	BUN↑, SCr↑, ALT↑, AST↑, TBIL↑, followed with ultrastructural damage	Hooser et al. [82]
Wistar rats	I.P.	55 μg/kg	24 h	Glomerular filtration rate↑, albuminuria↑, ROS↑ and Na+ reabsorption↓, microstructural and ultrastructural damage	Lowe et al. [84]
Balb/c mice	I.P.	22, 43 μg/kg	0.5, 4 h	Kidney relative weight↑, UA↑	Lei et al. [85]
KM mice	I.P.	10 μg/kg	13 days	ALT↑, AST↑, ALP↑,BUN↑, SCr↑, MDA↑, LPO↑ and microstructural damage	Xu et al. [86]
KM mice	I.P.	3, 6, 12 μg/kg	7 days	Kidney absolute weight↓, Kidney relative weight↑, DNA-protein crosslinking↑ and protein carbonyl↑	Dong et al. [88]
ICR mice	I.P.	20 μg/kg	21 days	Apoptosis, CHOP↓, caspase-12↓, Bcl-2↑	Qin et al. [36]
Wistar rats	I.P.	100, 150 μg/kg	8 h	GSH-Px↓, GR↓, SOD↓, CAT↓, LPO↑	Moreno et al. [90]
KM mice	I.P.	5 μg/kg	15 days	MDA↑, GSH↓, SOD↓, CAT↓	Han et al. [91]
KM mice	I.P.	30 μg/kg	1, 4, 8 h	ALT↑, SOD↑, CAT↑, BUN first↓ then↑, and all the biochemical indicators are reversible	Li et al. [92]
SD rats	I.P.	30 μg/kg	1, 3, 7, 12 h	Microstructural damage	Li et al. [92]
Male mice	I.P.	25μg/kg	1, 2 months	Kidney relative weight↑, GSH↓, GPH-Px↓, SOD↓, CAT↓, NOx↑ and partial of indicators are reversible after one month’s cleaning period	Sedan et al. [93]
C57BL/6 mice	P.O.	1, 30, 60, 90,120 μg/L	3, 6 months	BUN↓, microstructural and ultrastructural damage	Yi et al. [30]
Wistar rats	I.P.	10 μg/L	8 months	Microstructural damage	Milutinović et al. [94]
Wistar rats	I.P.	10 μg/L	8 months	Microstructural damage, apoptosis↑, cytoskeleton disruption↑	Milutinović et al. [95]

I.P. = intraperitoneal; P.O. = peroral; ↑ = effect increase; ↓ = effect decrease.