The New Anthelmintic Tribendimidine is an L-type (Levamisole and Pyrantel) Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptor Agonist
Figure 4
trb mutants resist tribendimidine-induced sterility.
Brood sizes of N2 wild-type (wt) and trb mutant hermaphrodites after 64 h on either no drug or three different doses of tribendimidine. The experiment was done at 25° and repeated a total of three times with five wells/experiment/genotype/dose (thus each bar represents brood sizes from 15 worms). Whereas the brood size of wild-type animals decreases upon exposure to tribendimidine (P<0.01 for 0 vs. 50 µg/mL; P<0.001 for 0 vs. 100 and 200 µg/mL), the brood sizes of all four trb mutants are unaffected even by the highest dose of tribendimidine tested (P>0.05 for all pair-wise comparisons of all doses for any given mutant). The relative brood sizes of wild-type animals at 50, 100, and 200 µg/mL are respectively 31%, 12%, and 5% of the brood size without toxin. The brood size of trb-4 animals in the absence of drug is clearly lower than that of the other genotypes. Further data and discussion of brood sizes of wild-type vs. trb animals in the absence of drug is given in Figure S2. Error bars represent standard deviations. Allele designations are as in Figure 1.