Abstract
IntroductionPersistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) accumulate in adipose tissue and some are described to possess endocrine disrupting capacities. Therefore, it is important to evaluate their effects on key endocrine pathways in adipose tissue (AT), to further evaluate their potential role in metabolic pathologies such as obesity.ObjectivesThe aim is twofold: (i) evaluate gene expression levels of obesity marker genes, i.e. the adipokines leptin (LEP), adiponectin (ADIPOQ) and Tumor Necrosis Factor α (TNFα) and the nuclear receptor, Peroxisome Proliferator Activated Receptor γ (PPARγ) in paired subcutaneous (SAT) and visceral (VAT) AT of obese subjects (n = 50) and to relate these values to serum concentrations of LEP and ADIPOQ (ii) evaluate the association of expression levels of marker genes in AT and serum with POP concentrations in AT.Results and ConclusionsLeptin and adiponectin levels in serum were positively correlated to respectively expression levels of leptin in SAT and adiponectin in VAT. Our study shows more significant correlations between gene expression of obesity marker genes and POP concentrations in VAT compared to SAT. Since VAT is more important than SAT in pathologies associated with obesity, this suggests that POPs are able to influence the association between obesity and the development of associated pathologies. Moreover, this finding reveals the importance of VAT when investigating the obesogen hypothesis. Concerning PPARγ expression in VAT, negative correlations with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) concentrations were found in non T2D patients. LEP serum concentrations correlated with several PCBs in women whereas in men no correlations were found. This strengthens the potential importance of gender differences in obesity and within the obesogen hypothesis.
Highlights
Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) accumulate in adipose tissue and some are described to possess endocrine disrupting capacities
Gene expression values of the obesity marker genes leptin, adiponectin, Tumor Necrosis Factor a (TNFa) and Peroxisome Proliferator Activated Receptor c (PPARc) were measured in paired SAT and VAT samples of 50 obese patients
Leptin and adiponectin hormone expression levels were measured in serum samples of these patients
Summary
Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) accumulate in adipose tissue and some are described to possess endocrine disrupting capacities. It is important to evaluate their effects on key endocrine pathways in adipose tissue (AT), to further evaluate their potential role in metabolic pathologies such as obesity. The environmental obesogen hypothesis endorses this statement, stating that prenatal or lifetime exposure to environmental pollutants plays a role in the global obesity epidemic [3]. In this context, several in vitro, in vivo and epidemiological studies have investigated the potential link of POPs with obesity development [reviewed in [2] and[4]]. Epidemiological studies investigating the link between POPs and obesity are in general focusing on relationships between POPs and waist-hip-ratio, BMI or other anthropometric measurements (reviewed in [4])
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