Use of Caenorhabditis elegans as a pollution biosensor in Xiamen Seawater
利用秀丽小杆线虫Caenorhabditis elegans监测厦门岛海水水质

Caenorhabditis elegans was applied as a pollution biosensor because of its small size, high fecundity and short generation time. Its mortality is a biomonitoring criterion which indicates the degree of pollution. In this study, both the mortality of the wild-type worm and the staining of a transgenic strain were used to test the quality of surface water samples from five stations in the Xiamen sea area. Comparison of both results show that mortality and staining were correlated. Using C. elegans stress-inducible transgenie worms as biosensors could shorten the testing time and improve the sensitivity of environmental monitoring.