EGRU-blog

Sometimes one has to travel to the end of the world to find what was right in front of you. Like clove oil.

Couple of days ago, a discussion in Trivandrum, India, slipped on a side-track and came to touch upon anesthetics used in research. I commented on the extravagant prices of MS-222 to hear about an alternative: clove oil.

As it turns out, oil from the seeds of clove (Syzygium aromaticum) is apparently widely used an anesthetic in fish research. As pointed out to me by A. Gopalakrishnan from the Indian National Bureau of Fish Genetic Resources (Kochi), the clove oil should be familiar to anyone who has ever visited a dentist: have a sniff on clove seeds and think about your last visit to a dentist. I believe you will make the association in a split second.

Here couple of references to uses of clove oil as an anesthetic:

Wagner, E; Arndt, R; Hilton, B (2002) Physiological stress responses, egg survival and sperm motility for rainbow trout broodstock anesthetized with clove oil, tricaine methanesulfonate or carbon dioxide. Aquaculture 211: 353-366.

Kennedy, BM; Gale, WL; Ostrand, KG (2007) Evaluation of clove oil concentrations for use as an anesthetic during field processing and passive integrated transponder implantation of juvenile steelhead. Northwest Science 81: 147-154.

Wagner, GN; Singer, TD; McKinley, RS (2003) The ability of clove oil and MS-222 to minimize handling stress in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss Walbaum). Aquaculture Research 34:1139-1146.