Head and Lateral Line Erosion (HLLE)

[Jay Hemdal]

I just started carbon after the addition of my first tang - a Tomini. I am using large diameter pelletized carbon in a reactor with no fluidized motion or grinding. The reactor output is fed into a 5 micron filter sock. I am monitoring the fish each day and report any HLLE within 30 days. Not scientific, but maybe a good anecdote.

You have a number of things going for you here; tomini's don't easily get HLLE, using pelleted carbon, and then, the post-filtration. The only downside is that 30 days is almost always too soon to tell. Four months is a better time test.

Jay

 

[chadfish]

You have a number of things going for you here; tomini's don't easily get HLLE, using pelleted carbon, and then, the post-filtration. The only downside is that 30 days is almost always too soon to tell. Four months is a better time test.

Jay

Great. So if he develops HLLE then I surely screwed up!

 

[Cory]

Ive used small amounts of carbon sparingly but haven't used it in a month or so now. I have 5 fish, a fully grown emperor angelfish, a fully grown orange spot rabbitfish, and a yellow tang, scopas tang, and panther grouper. None of them except the scopas tang has developed HLLE near the head.

The scopas tang always had minor abrasions near his head, i suspected from carbon use but until I started using ozone on the system has his conditon gotten much worse. I dont use carbon with my ozone, just ozone. I wonder why its getting worse with ozone and no carbon use? Im running 200mg/l on 150ish gallons for 9 minute's every hour via apex control.

Im curious if ozone is destroying the organics making the heavy metal toxicity theory work here too.

I was reading something about glutamine and fishes lateral line. Now i wonder if activated carbon is removing glutamine and ozone destroying it? Do fish need glutamine to develope a slime coat or something?

"The mechanoreceptive hair cells of the lateral line structure are integrated into more complex circuits through their afferent and efferent connections. The synapses that directly participate in the transduction of mechanical information are excitatory afferent connections that utilize glutamate.[18] "

I used poly lab pro carbon before fwiw.

 

[Cory]

A non-toxic dose of cobalt chloride blocks hair cells of the zebrafish lateral line

Abstract

Experiments on the flow-sensitive lateral line system of fishes have provided important insights into the function and sensory transduction of vertebrate hair cells. A common experimental approach has been to pharmacologically block lateral line hair cells and measure how behavior changes. Cobalt chloride (CoCl2) blocks the lateral line by inhibiting calcium movement through the membrane channels of hair cells, but high concentrations can be toxic, making it unclear whether changes in behavior are due to a blocked lateral line or poor health. Here, we identify a non-toxic treatment of cobalt that completely blocks lateral line hair cells. We exposed 5-day post fertilization zebrafish larvae to CoCl2 concentrations ranging from 1–20 mM for 15 minutes and measured 1) the spiking rate of the afferent neurons contacting hair cells and 2) the larvae’s health and long-term survival. Our results show that a 15-minute exposure to 5 mM CoCl2 abolishes both spontaneous and evoked afferent firing. This treatment does not change swimming behavior, and results in >85% survival after 5 days. Weaker treatments of CoCl2 did not eliminate afferent activity, while stronger treatments caused close to 50% mortality. Our work provides a guideline for future zebrafish investigations where physiological confirmation of a blocked lateral line system is required.

 

[Cory]

Mechanical overstimulation causes acute injury and synapse loss followed by fast 2 recovery in lateral-line neuromasts of larval zebrafish

Abstract 18 Excess noise damages sensory hair cells, resulting in loss of synaptic connections with 19 auditory nerves and hair-cell death. The cellular mechanisms underlying mechanically induced 20 hair-cell damage and subsequent repair are not completely understood. Hair cells in 21 neuromasts of larval zebrafish are structurally and functionally comparable to mammalian hair 22 cells but undergo robust regeneration following damage. We therefore developed a model for 23 mechanically induced hair-cell damage in this highly tractable system. Free swimming larvae 24 exposed to strong water current for 2 hours displayed mechanical injury to neuromasts, 25 including afferent neurite retraction, damaged hair bundles, and reduced mechanotransduction. 26 Synapse loss was observed in apparently intact exposed neuromasts, and this loss was 27 exacerbated by inhibiting glutamate uptake. Mechanical damage also elicited an inflammatory 28 response and macrophage recruitment. Remarkably, neuromast morphology, synapse number, 29 and hair-cell function fully recovered within 2 days following exposure. Our results indicate 30 functional changes and synapse loss in mechanically damaged lateral-line neuromasts that 31 appear similar to damage observed in noise-exposed mammalian ear yet are completely 32 repaired. 33 34 Keywords: Hair cell, mechanical damage, ribbon synapse, inflammation, regeneratio

 

[Cory]

Larval Zebrafish Lateral Line as a Model for Acoustic Trauma

Finally, we used the zebrafish lateral line as a tool to screen a select redox library for compounds that prevent acoustic stimulation-induced damage. Four compounds (glutathione, baicalein, D- α-tocopherylquinone, and ferulic acid ethylester) significantly protected lateral line hair cells from acoustic stimulation-induced hair cell damage (Fig. 11B), only one of which (glutathione) has been previously identified as a potential therapy to prevent NIHL (Ohinata et al., 2000).

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Larval Zebrafish Lateral Line as a Model for Acoustic Trauma

Finally, we used the zebrafish lateral line as a tool to screen a select redox library for compounds that prevent acoustic stimulation-induced damage. Four compounds (glutathione, baicalein, D- α-tocopherylquinone, and ferulic acid ethylester) significantly protected lateral line hair cells from acoustic stimulation-induced hair cell damage (Fig. 11B), only one of which (glutathione) has been previously identified as a potential therapy to prevent NIHL (Ohinata et al., 2000).

I know little about glutamine. As an amino acid, would the uptake and processing of it all be through the food cycle? I don't see how anything in the water would have an effect on amino acids.

The trouble is, zebrafish don't exhibit HLLE. I tried to locate the histopathology reports from my study fish to see if they reported hair cell damage, but I couldn't find them.

Ozone has only anecdotally been tied to HLLE - we run ozone but no carbon and we have no cases of HLLE in our systems.

Jay

 

[Projects with Sam]

I have an Emperor angelfish that was given to me just starting to develop HLLE around the eyes and in a few months intense feeding with various prepackaged frozen foods + homemade food + Brightwell Angelixir and endless nori clips he seems to be healing.
also, I've had decent success with some Hippo Tangs I got on discount because they were so bad:

Hippo Tang HLLE Recovery progress from January 22 2022 - March 5 2022

I got this guy from the lfs basically for free in the hopes I could help him out. Here are two videos taken ~5weeks apart. I fed him appropriately and added vitamins (VitaChem - didn't know about SELCON at the time.) I am encouraged by his progress. January: March:

www.reef2reef.com

They are also doing much better. The small one grew to about the size of the other since then. He is still permanently disfigured but is much better then before.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I have an Emperor angelfish that was given to me just starting to develop HLLE around the eyes and in a few months intense feeding with various prepackaged frozen foods + homemade food + Brightwell Angelixir and endless nori clips he seems to be healing.
also, I've had decent success with some Hippo Tangs I got on discount because they were so bad:

Hippo Tang HLLE Recovery progress from January 22 2022 - March 5 2022

I got this guy from the lfs basically for free in the hopes I could help him out. Here are two videos taken ~5weeks apart. I fed him appropriately and added vitamins (VitaChem - didn't know about SELCON at the time.) I am encouraged by his progress. January: March:

www.reef2reef.com

They are also doing much better. The small one grew to about the size of the other since then. He is still permanently disfigured but is much better then before.

One key thing - moving fish to a new tank has been shown to cause reversal of HLLE in many cases. Moving the fish and then changing the diet introduces two variables at the same time. This was the reason why there was the "natural sunlight" cures HLLE came about...a public aquarium moved fish from one system to another and saw the HLLE go away. The difference they thought, was natural sunlight. However, years later, that was determined not to be the causative factor.

The same was the flaw in the early "vitamin C cures HLLE" study - where the researcher ran no controls, and one of the aspects of his study was to first move his study fish to new tanks (grin). It took decades for people to stop using vitamin C to try and cure HLLE.... I think I posted this story here, but it bears repeating; about 15 years ago, a researcher in Florida ran a study to examine vitamins and HLLE. She had things properly set up with controls, etc. However, her study was cancelled when her control fish developed HLLE. Turns out one of her assistants thought the water looked a bit dingy, so they put a carbon filter on the tank.....

I once had a concrete vat that I could use to induce HLLE - move fish into it and the fish developed, move them out to our reef system and it would go away. I finally stripped the vat down and changed everything and stopped using carbon and it no longer induced HLLE.

Jay