Developmental exposure to different concentrations of Sertraline. (A) Hatching rate (%) of control and exposed embryos, recorded daily for 72 h. (B) Accumulated mortality of control and exposed embryos/larvae, recorded daily throughout the exposure period. Values represented are mean ± standard error (SE). No statistical differences were observed (n = 120) (Tukey post hoc).

Representative zebrafish larvae (8dpf) following developmental exposure to different concentrations of SER. Lateral view.

Behavioral changes on zebrafish eight dpf larvae, following developmental exposure (188 h) to different concentrations of SER. Startle - acoustic/vibrational escape response, represented as the total distance (cm) traveled following the delivery of a tapping stimulus (n = 79–82); Habituation of the acoustic/vibrational escape response evoked by a series of 50 tapping stimuli delivered every second represented as the area under the curve (AUC) of larvae responses (n = 76–82). Basal Locomotor (BLM) activity, represented as the total distance (cm) traveled during 10min (n = 76–83); Visual-motor response (VMR), reporting the response of larvae due to transition of light to dark, represented as the difference of the total distance (cm) traveled by larvae during 2 minutes after and before the transition of light to dark (n = 68–84); Data are from two to three independent experiments and are reported as scatter plots with the median (red line). Different letters indicate statistical subset groups following either Tukey post hoc (Startle and VMR) or Kruskal Wallis test (Habituation and BLM).

Effects on the serotonergic system of zebrafish larvae following developmental exposure to different concentrations of SER. Data were reported as boxplots or scatter plots (red line—median), for gene expression (A) or neurochemical levels (B), respectively. One-way ANOVA followed by Tukey multiple comparison test was used for gene expression (n = 6–8), whereas Kruskal Wallis test was used for neurochemical analyses (n = 4–6). Different letters represent different subset groups.

Expression of genes related to the dopaminergic pathway in zebrafish larvae following developmental exposure to SER. Results are represented as boxplots (n = 6–8). Different letters represent different subset groups, following Tukey multiple comparison test.

Dopaminergic neurotransmitter profiles of 8dpf zebrafish larvae, following developmental exposure (4hpf to 8dpf) to different concentrations of SER. Results are depicted as scatter plots (n = 4–6) with the median (red line) and represented as ng/mg of protein. Different letters represent different subset groups following Tukey post hoc test.