Abstract
Due to their antimicrobial properties, silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) are used in a wide range of consumer products that includes topical wound dressings, coatings for biomedical devices, and food-packaging to extend the shelf-life. Despite their beneficial antimicrobial effects, developmental exposure to such AgNPs may lead to gut dysbiosis and long-term health consequences in exposed offspring. AgNPs can cross the placenta and blood–brain-barrier to translocate in the brain of offspring. The underlying hypothesis tested in the current study was that developmental exposure of male and female mice to AgNPs disrupts the microbiome–gut–brain axis. To examine for such effects, C57BL6 female mice were exposed orally to AgNPs at a dose of 3 mg/kg BW or vehicle control 2 weeks prior to breeding and throughout gestation. Male and female offspring were tested in various mazes that measure different behavioral domains, and the gut microbial profiles were surveyed from 30 through 120 days of age. Our study results suggest that developmental exposure results in increased likelihood of engaging in repetitive behaviors and reductions in resident microglial cells. Echo-MRI results indicate increased body fat in offspring exposed to AgNPs exhibit. Coprobacillus spp., Mucispirillum spp., and Bifidobacterium spp. were reduced, while Prevotella spp., Bacillus spp., Planococcaceae, Staphylococcus spp., Enterococcus spp., and Ruminococcus spp. were increased in those developmentally exposed to NPs. These bacterial changes were linked to behavioral and metabolic alterations. In conclusion, developmental exposure of AgNPs results in long term gut dysbiosis, body fat increase and neurobehavioral alterations in offspring.
Highlights
Due to their antimicrobial properties, silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) are used in a wide range of consumer products that includes topical wound dressings, coatings for biomedical devices, and food-packaging to extend the shelf-life
Offspring were tested in various mazes that measure different behavioral domains, and the gut microbial profiles were surveyed from 30 through 120 days of age. Materials used in these studies, surface coating and dosage of AgNPs, sample preparation for silver quantification by ICP-OES, methods for Barnes maze, elevated plus maze (EPM), body composition analysis, brain histopathological analyses and morphometric quantification, collection of fecal samples, isolation of fecal microbial DNA, and 16s rRNA sequencing are included in Supplementary Material
Dialysis was performed on concentrated silver nanoparticles to remove silver ions and the dialysates were used for the study[61]
Summary
Due to their antimicrobial properties, silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) are used in a wide range of consumer products that includes topical wound dressings, coatings for biomedical devices, and food-packaging to extend the shelf-life Despite their beneficial antimicrobial effects, developmental exposure to such AgNPs may lead to gut dysbiosis and long-term health consequences in exposed offspring. Select studies have suggested that perinatal exposure to AgNPs can affect neurobehavioral programming and other offspring parameters in rodent m odels[36,43,55,56,57], more work is needed to understand the potential health effects in mammals of developmental exposure to such compounds
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