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Impact of chronic sub-lethal methylparaben exposure on cardiac hypoxia and alterations in neuroendocrine factors in zebrafish model

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Abstract

Background

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals have been shown to cause toxicity in different systems of the body including the endocrine, cardiovascular and nervous systems. This study aims to analyze the adverse effects of Methylparaben (MP) on cardiac functions, neurodevelopment, and behavior of zebrafish.

Methods and results

Adult male and female zebrafish were exposed to MP for 30 days to study the toxicity effects. Zebrafish were grouped into control, solvent control, 1/10th (110 ppb), 1/100th, and 1/1000th (1 ppb) lethal concentration 50 of MP. Neurobehavioral assays, acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity, serotonin levels, and expression of genes—Hypoxia-inducible factor 1 alpha, Neurotrophic Receptor Tyrosine Kinase, Paired box protein Pax-6, and tnnt2 were investigated in zebrafish. Results of the study showed more anxiety-like behavior in MP-treated female zebrafish when compared to males on chronic exposure. There was a dose-dependent reduction of AChE activity in both male and female zebrafish. Female zebrafish showed a dose-dependent increase in serotonin level on MP exposure while male zebrafish showed a dose-independent decrease in serotonin level. On MP exposure, there was also a dose-dependent dysregulation in the expression of cardiac hypoxia and neuronal differentiation-related genes in female zebrafish while a dose-independent change was observed in male zebrafish.

Conclusion

Chronic MP exposure affects cardiac functions, neuronal functions, and behavior of zebrafish by exhibiting changes in AChE activity, serotonin levels, and altering the expression of genes related to cardiac hypoxia and neuronal differentiation even at sub-lethal doses.

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Data availability

Data and materials are available from the correspondence author upon request.

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Acknowledgements

We thank all the students working in our laboratory have contributed to the collection of data required for this research work. We would also like to thank the Department of Biotechnology, School of Bioengineering, SRM Institute of Science and Technology, Kattankulathur, Tamil Nadu, India for providing us with the facilities for carrying out our work. We extend our gratitude to Usharani Balu, Poornima Ananthasubramanian, Sanjana Jayacumar, N. Jaswant Samuel, Deva Sureshbabu, S. Murli Krishnan, Sooriyakumar S, Sandhya Ramanan, Hamsini S, Vibha K, Keerthanah Sivakumar, Uma K Arun, and Maansi Srivastava.

Funding

The authors did not receive any financial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biotechnology, School of Bioengineering, SRM Institute of Science and Technology, Kattankulathur, Tamil Nadu, 603203, India

    Sweta Thakkar, Barathi Seetharaman & Vasantharekha Ramasamy

Authors
  1. Sweta Thakkar
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  2. Barathi Seetharaman
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  3. Vasantharekha Ramasamy
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Contributions

ST executed the work, RV designed the experimental work, and BS helped in cross verification of data and statistical analysis.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Vasantharekha Ramasamy.

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that there is no potential conflict of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all authors included in the study.

Research involving human and/or animal participants

This article does not contain any studies with human participants. Animal experimentation: Zebrafish handling was carried out in accordance with the ethical standards of the Institutional research committee and was ethically approved by the Institutional Animal Ethics Committee (IAEC) (project proposal number: SAF/210405/06) of SRM Engineering College, SRM Institute of Science and Technology, Kattankulathur, Tamil Nadu, India.

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Thakkar, S., Seetharaman, B. & Ramasamy, V. Impact of chronic sub-lethal methylparaben exposure on cardiac hypoxia and alterations in neuroendocrine factors in zebrafish model. Mol Biol Rep 49, 331–340 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-021-06878-w

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