Penicillin-Induced Oxidative Stress: Effects on Antioxidative Response of Midgut Tissues in Instars of <I>Galleria mellonella</I>

Abstract

Penicillin and other antibiotics are routinely incorporated in insect culture media. Although culturing insects in the presence of antibiotics is a decades-old practice, antibiotics can exert deleterious influences on insects. In this article, we test the hypothesis that one of the effects of dietary penicillin is to increase oxidative stress on insects. The effects of penicillin on midgut concentrations of the oxidative stress indicator malondialdehyde (MDA) and on midgut antioxidant enzyme (superoxide dismutase [SOD], catalase [CAT], glutathione S-transferase [GST], and glutathione peroxidase [GPx]) and transaminases (alanine aminotransferase and aspartate aminotransferase) activities in greater wax moth, Galleria mellonella (L.), were investigated. The insects were reared from first instars on artificial diets containing 0.001, 0.01, 0.1, or 1.0 g penicillin per 100 g of diets. MDA content was significantly increased in the midgut tissues of each larval instar reared in the presence of high penicillin concentrations. Activities of antioxidant and transaminase enzymes did not show a consistent pattern with respect to penicillin concentrations in diet or age of larvae. Despite the increased penicillin-induced oxidative stress in gut tissue, antioxidant and transaminase enzymes did not correlate with oxidative stress level or between each other in larvae of other age stages except for the seventh instar. We found a significant negative correlation of MDA content with SOD and GST activities in seventh instars. SOD activity was also negatively correlated with CAT activity in seventh instars. These results suggest that exposure to dietary penicillin resulted in impaired enzymatic antioxidant defense capacity and metabolic functions in wax moth larval midgut tissues and that the resulting oxidative stress impacts midgut digestive physiology.