H. HANUMANTHA REDDYA AND C. S. KARIGAR
Abstract
The increase in the fluoride levels of the ground water lead to fluorosis in humans. Environmental monitoring of fluoride toxicity is required to know the extent of pollution and its impact on the biodiversity. Earthworm can be developed as a model to study the effects of fluoride levels and the associated ecotoxicity. In this study three enzyme biomarkers in earthworm, Eudrilus eugenia, have been assessed. The fluoride 1_,D50 value was found to be 3.32 g of NaF per Kg feed. All the biomarkers selected exhibited lower values in the presence of fluoride. The esterase (EST), acetyl cholinesterase (AChE) and catalase (CAT) activities were 42.08%, 33.36 % and 17.5% respectively. Thus these observations can be adopted as bioinarkers for monitoring ecotoxicity of NaF in terrestrial and aquatic organisms. species and have been successfully applied to birds (Johnston 1995), fish (Adams et al. 1990) and invertebrates (Lagabic et al. 1994). In this context earthworms can be used as model for environmental