Abstract: Phycobiliprotein, which is a new natural edible pigment extracted from fresh laver. In order to insure the safety of food, we carried out LD50 of rats and mice per oral, micronucleus test in mice bone marrow, analy-sis of spermatocyte chromosome aberration in mice testes, Ames test, and 30-day feeding test was performed on weanling wistar rats. The re-sults showed that the acute toxicity of the pigment were very low. No statistical significant difference was detected in the Ames test, micro-nucleus test and analysis of testis chromosome aberration between the ex-perimental groups and the control group. Mutagenicity was not discovered. The study indicates that phycobiliprotein is a safe promising natural edible pigment.

Key words: phycobiliprotein, edible pigment, laver, toxicology