Risk assessment of the Lithium toxicity

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20K18902
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Early-Career Scientists
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Basic Section 58020:Hygiene and public health-related: including laboratory approach
• Research Institution: Aichi Cancer Center Research Institute (2023); Meijo University (2020-2022)
• Principal Investigator: Kondo-Ida Lisa (井田梨沙) 愛知県がんセンター(研究所), 分子腫瘍学分野, リサーチレジデント (00809436)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: リチウム / 発癌

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Water scarcity and water-borne diseases are seruous problems in developing countries. In these countries, despite the health risks associated with consuming unsanitary water, improving the quality of drinking water remains challenging. Our fieldwork study in Afghanistan showed that the level of lithium in well water is higher than other countries. We thus investigated the health risk of lithium. We found that lithium promoted anchorage-independent growth of human immortalized epithelial cells, while did not effect on carcinoma cell. We further detected that lithium treatment upregulate the phosphorylation of c-SRC and MEK/ERK but not AKT. Our results suggested that lithium might be a potential oncogenic risk through promoting transformation of non-tumorigenic cells with preferential activation of the c-SRC/MEK/ERK pathway.

Free Research Field

分子腫瘍学、環境学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

発展途上国の飲用水汚染により多様な健康被害が発生している。本研究は、飲用水の元素汚染の現状を把握し、発癌毒性を有する元素の特定を目的としており、独自の元素分析により、飲用水中に高濃度のリチウムが含有されていることを明らかにした。リチウムは日本でも双極性障害の治療に用いられることから、毒性リスクの検証および治療方法の探索は重要な課題である。