Fig. 7: ATP/P2X receptors may mediate CEMA.

a Suramin eliminates the protective effect of large group size against thioridazine-induced craniofacial defects and death. Tadpoles in groups of 300 were treated with 100 µM suramin, 90 µM thioridazine, 90 µM thioridazine and 100 µM suramin together, and compared to 90 µM thioridazine exposure as singletons. Blue arrows showing normal eyes, pigmentation, and head shape. Purple arrows show defects in those regions. b Percent defect of each group (n = 300 for each group) was then quantified. ****p < 0.0001 and ***p = 0.0002. c Thioridazine concentration was constant at 90 µM across all treatments and calcium or P2 receptor blockers were added. Calcium was depleted using 5 µM BAPTA. P2 receptors were inhibited with 100 µM PPADS. Each treatment group had a total of n = 300 embryos. ****p < 0.0001. d Quantification of extracellular ATP concentration. *p = 0.0443. Each dot represents the average of a group of three replicates. All animal images are dorsal views, and are oriented with the anterior end at the top of the image. For all data: values are plotted as mean ± SD, one-way ANOVA, and Tukey tests were conducted, and ***p ≤ 0.001, **p ≤ 0.01, *p ≤ 0.05. All treatments are normalized to the mean of non-treated controls’ spontaneous defects. Scale bars represent 2 mm. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.