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Chemopreventive Agents
Published in David E. Thurston, Ilona Pysz, Chemistry and Pharmacology of Anticancer Drugs, 2021
Zearalenone is produced by fungi that colonize wheat, barley, maize, and other grains (Figure 12.20). It has been linked to abnormal sexual development and birth defects in pigs and other livestock, and is suspected of having caused an outbreak of premature breast development among girls in Puerto Rico in the 1970s. Genistein is produced in a number of plants including soybeans and is often highly concentrated in phytoestrogen-rich food supplements (see Section 12.4.4.1.1).
Environmental toxicants on Leydig cell function
Published in C. Yan Cheng, Spermatogenesis, 2018
Leping Ye, Xiaoheng Li, Xiaomin Chen, Qingquan Lian, Ren-Shan Ge
Many fungi produce toxins. Zearalenone is one of them. Zearalenone is a mycotoxin produced by some Fusarium and Gibberella species. Studies have pointed to the possible toxicity of zearalenone in Leydig cells. Zearalenone inhibited LH-stimulated testosterone production in mouse Leydig cells.265 However, it did not affect the expression and the binding activity of LHCGR.265 It also downregulated Cyp11a1, Cyp17a, and Hsd17b3 mRNA levels, possibly via suppressing Nur77 (a transcription factor) expression in mouse Leydig cells.265 Zearalenone inhibited cell growth and increased autophagy in rat Leydig cells.266 It was found that zearalenone induced Leydig cell apoptosis via an endoplasmic reticulum stress-dependent signaling pathway.267 Proteomics analysis showed that zearalenone increased energy production through promoting fatty acid uptake and beta-oxidation and increased excessive oxidative stress, thus possibly leading to lower steroidogenic enzyme expression levels.268 Prevention of ROS did not seem to restore steroidogenesis in MA-10 Leydig cells,269 suggesting that its ROS-inducing effect does not contribute to the inhibition of steroidogenesis. α-Zearalenol (0.01–100 μM), a zearalenone metabolite, also suppressed hCG-induced testosterone production and downregulated Star, Cyp11a1, and Hsd3b1 in mouse Leydig cells,270 indicating a similar mechanism to that of zearalenone.
Antifungal Activity of Seaweeds and their Extracts
Published in Leonel Pereira, Therapeutic and Nutritional Uses of Algae, 2018
It is of worldwide importance on small grain cereals and corn, occurring under a wide range of soil and environmental conditions. F. graminearum has become one of the most significant cereal diseases. The fungus can produce several mycotoxins, including deoxynivalenol (DON) and zearalenone (Turkington et al. 2014).
Toxic and irritant effects induced by zearalenone: prevention by taurine
Published in Toxin Reviews, 2021
Zearalenone (ZEN) is a non-steroidal estrogenic mycotoxin produced by the Fusarium species (Bertero et al. 2018). ZEN is a significant contaminant of many agricultural products thus is a major economic and health problem (Kuiper-Goodman et al. 1987, Zinedine et al. 2007). Several systematic review and meta-analytic approaches reported that 32% of mixed cereal products in Europe were contaminated by ZEN and these products were cornflakes (55%), bread (41%), breakfast cereals (37%), biscuit (22%), pasta (17%), respectively (Mousavi Khaneghah et al. 2018, Al-Jaal et al. 2019). Previous studies declared that the concentration of ZEN in human food could be found at a high level, up to 289 μg/g (Yuwai et al. 1994, Ghedira-Chekir et al. 1999). Therefore, ZEN and its metabolites (α-zearalenol and β-zearalenol) is a potential danger to human and animal health.
Autophagy in male reproduction
Published in Systems Biology in Reproductive Medicine, 2019
Yinci Zhu, Qingqing Yin, Dandan Wei, Zhenyu Yang, Yanzhi Du, Yi Ma
Zearalenone (ZEA), a nonsteroidal estrogenic mycotoxin, can be found in many food products. In ZEA-treated rat Leydig cells, the levels of apoptosis and autophagy are upregulated. Pretreatment with the autophagy inhibitor CQ increased the rate of apoptosis, while rapamycin decreased the rate of apoptosis, which implied a protective role of autophagy against ZEA-induced apoptosis (Wang Y. et al. 2014). Similar results can be concluded from the ZEA-treated rat Sertoli cells, xenoestrogen 4-nonylphenol (NP)-treated rat Sertoli cells, bisphenol A (BPA)-treated goat Sertoli cells, and dibutyl phthalate (DBP)-treated prepubertal rat germ cells (Duan et al. 2016; Zhang G. et al. 2016, Zhang Y. et al. 2017; Wang et al. 2018). In contrast, after being treated with a high dose of microcystin-LR (MC-LR), the accumulated autophagosomes seemed to facilitate the apoptotic process by elevating cytochrome C (Cyt C) and caspase 3 in rat Sertoli cells. In addition, the MC-LR-induced abnormalities were alleviated after the treatment with the autophagy inhibitor 3-MA (Chen et al. 2013). A cytotoxic role of autophagy could also be observed in the di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP)-treated mouse TM3 Leydig cells (Sun et al. 2018).
Mycotoxin exposure and pregnancy
Published in Critical Reviews in Toxicology, 2020
İlknur Münevver Gönenç, Neslihan Yilmaz Sezer, Serkan Yilmaz
Gao et al. (2017) conducted the toxic effects of Zearalenone (ZEN) on maternal SD rats and the F1 female offspring, compared to the controls. The groups which were exposed to 10 and 20 mg/kg ZEN indicated decreased feed intake and body weight of pregnant rats and/or female offspring. Meanwhile, 20 mg/kg ZEN was observed to significantly decrease birth weight (Gao et al. 2017). Similarly, Supriya et al. (2016), investigating the effects of prenatal exposure to graded doses of aflatoxin B1 on the pregnancy outcomes, found that the birth weight of the pups in the experimental group was significantly lower than that of controls (Supriya et al. 2016). These results were also supported by Supriya and Reddy (2015).