Abstract
Because atrazine is a widely used herbicide, its adverse effects on the reproductive system have been extensively researched. In this study, we investigated the effects of atrazine exposure on porcine oocyte maturation and the possible mechanisms. Our results showed that the rates of oocyte maturation significantly decreased after treatment with 200 μM atrazine in vitro. Atrazine treatment resulted in abnormal spindle morphology but did not affect actin distribution. Atrazine exposure not only triggered a DNA damage response but also decreased MPF levels in porcine oocytes. Our results also revealed that atrazine worsened porcine oocyte quality by causing excessive accumulation of superoxide radicals, increasing cathepsin B activity, and decreasing the GSH level and mitochondrial membrane potential. Furthermore, atrazine decreased developmental competence of porcine oocytes up to the blastocyst stage and changed some properties: cell numbers, apoptosis, and related gene expression levels. Collectively, our results indicate that porcine oocyte maturation is defective after atrazine treatment at least through disruption of spindle morphology, MPF activity, and mitochondrial function and via induction of DNA damage, which probably reduces developmental competence.
Highlights
Atrazine (2-chloro-4-ethylamino-6-isopropyl-amino-s-triazine) is a cheap herbicide that is widely used worldwide to control crop weeds in the field, but because of its possible harmful effects, it is currently banned in some countries [1,2,3]
Most of oocytes had extruded polar bodies and were arrested at the meiosis II (MII) stage in control, 50-μM, and 100-μM atrazine groups, whereas in the 200-μM atrazine group, polar body extrusion was suppressed in the oocytes (Fig 1B)
We examined the effects of 200 μM atrazine on this process by evaluating the expression of two representative maternal transcripts, cdc2 and cyclin b1, which encode the regulatory subunits of maturation-promoting factor (MPF)
Summary
Atrazine (2-chloro-4-ethylamino-6-isopropyl-amino-s-triazine) is a cheap herbicide that is widely used worldwide to control crop weeds in the field, but because of its possible harmful effects, it is currently banned in some countries [1,2,3]. Atrazine is thought to have only mild toxicity, several studies have shown that it may damage an animal’s reproductive system [4]. Atrazine may affect the frog gonadal development [5] by inducing aromatase-driven development, and this process increases the conversion of androgen to estrogen [6, 7]. Because many studies have shown that atrazine can affect animal endocrine function, especially in the thyroid and reproductive systems, atrazine has been shown to interfere with the functioning of the endocrine system [8,9,10,11]. The effect of atrazine on the reproductive system is mainly mediated by the influence on steroid synthesis [12].
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