Effect of endocrine disrupters on photosystem II energy fluxes of green algae and cyanobacteria

Among the numerous toxics found in the aquatic environment, endocrine disrupters can interfere with the normal functioning of the endocrine system of several organisms, leading to important consequences. Even if algae and cyanobacteria are non-target organisms without endocrine system, our goals were to verify if endocrine disrupters can affect photosynthetic activity and how energy flows through photosystem II (PSII) were altered. To reach these objectives, we exposed, for 15 min, two green algae (Chlamydomonas reinhardtii strain CC125, Pseudokirchneriella subcapitata strain CPCC37) and a toxic and a non-toxic strain of Microcystis aeruginosa (CPCC299 and CPCC632 respectively) to 4-octylphenol, 4-nonylphenol and β-estradiol at concentrations ranging from 0.1 to 5 μg/mL. We have shown for the first time that endocrine disrupters may have drastic effects on PSII energy fluxes. Furthermore, we showed that various species have different sensitivity to endocrine disrupters. P. subcapitata was tolerant to each endocrine disrupter tested, while flows of energy through PSII were affected similarly, but at different extent, for the other species. Cyanobacterial PSII energy fluxes were more affected than green algae, suggesting that the prokaryotic characteristics of these organisms are responsible of their high sensitivity.

Research highlights
► Endocrine disrupters may have drastic effects on PSII energy fluxes.
► Algal species were differently affected by the endocrine disrupters.
► Non-toxic Microcystis aeruginosa cells were the most sensitive species to endocrine disrupters.