Acute toxicity and rapid excretion in urine of tetramethylarsonium salts found in some marine animals

Acute toxicity in mice, and excretion in their urine, of tetramethylarsonium salts which are arsenic compounds found in some marine animals, were examined using synthetic tetramethylarsonium iodide. The oral, intraperitoneal and intravenous LD₅₀ values of tetramethylarsonium iodide (CH₃)₄As⁺I^?] were determined to be 890, 175 and 82 mg kg^?1, respectively. When sublethal doses of tetramethylarsonium iodide were orally administered to mice, 53–58% of the arsenic administered was recovered in urine after 6 h and 65–81% after 72 h. High-performance liquid chromatography–inductively coupled plasma (HPLC–ICP) and fast atom bombardment mass spectrometric (FAB MS) analyses revealed that a tetramethylarsonium salt was the only arsenic compound excreted in urine. These results suggested that the major part of orally administered tetramethylarsonium iodide was absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract in mice and then rapidly excreted in urine without biotransformation.