Introduction

The Malacca Straits being one of the busiest sea routes for international navigation in the world is potentially prone to major oil and chemical spills. Apart from sea based pollution the straits is also compounded by land based pollution such as industrial and agricultural waste, sewage disposal etc. Such adverse effect and impact of pollution on marine organisms and its ecosystem are well known. However, the effect of this at the cellular and molecular level is less well documented. A better understanding of effect of marine pollution at the cellular and genetic level may provide early indicators of potential harmful and devastation pollution which can have serious impact on the whole fragile ecosystem.

Objectives

• To evaluate the impact of pollutants on DNA changes in fish

• To analyse impact of pollutants on fish behaviour

• To determine impact of pollutants on genomic changes in bacteria

• To establish bacterial molecular markers as indicator of pollution sources

Methodologies

The screening and identification of mutagenic changes in physiologically important genes of marine organism thus provides clues on such pollution impacts. Rapid methods are hence needed to detect DNA sequence variations in order to comprehend the effect of such mutations at the cellular level and the risk it pose to human in general. This together with cytopathological and behavioural pattern studies of marine life may permit the development of new strategies in controlling pollution. The emergence of marine pathogens that may cause concern to human health could also be screened and tools could be developed for rapid diagnostic and detection procedures of the pathogens. The susceptibility of commercially important fish and shrimp to diseases due to pollution could also be investigated at the molecular level.

Expected Output

The availability of an automated DNA sequencer will allow analysis such as the above to be carried out at the fraction of the time required as compared to traditional method. It is expected that such system will allow us to characterize pollution based mutation and possibly the mutagen itself. The set up could also be further exploited to become an establishment or center, the very first of its kind anywhere for mutagenic studies with relevance to marine pollution. Apart from that, such system will also allow us to develop better and faster diagnostic procedures for screening of marine human pathogens and economically important aquatic diseases.

Researcher