Background: Dinoflagellates are the major causative agents of harmful algal blooms. In different studies, it has been shown that many dinoflagellate species produce various natural toxins. Saxitoxin, brevetoxin, yessotoxin, etc can be considered as the most important neurotoxins. The most important dinoflagellate toxins structures, their origin, structure and mechanisms of action were evaluated in a systematic review.

Materials & Methods: Marine dinoflagellates, marine toxins, and their mechanisms of action and structure were keywords for a comprehensive search in online databases including Pubmed, Science Direct, Google Scholar and Scirus. A total of 95 papers were evaluated, however, by omitting similar reports, 68 papers were included in the study.

Results: Dinoflagellates toxins are usually polycyclic ether and polyketaide compounds that have distinct mechanisms of action including alteration in different ion channels and/or pumps at cell membrane, effect on the normal functioning of neuronal and other excitable tissues, inhibition of serine/threonine phosphoprotein phosphatases, disrupting major mechanisms of controlling cellular functions, and alteration in cellular cytoskeleton. However, the precise mechanisms of action of few toxins are not determined yet.

Conclusion: The clarification of the dinoflagellate toxins structures and their mechanisms of action may be helpful for novel drug design, therapeutic measures and to overcome against marine toxicity.