Department of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Southeast University, Nanjing 210009, China; Key Laboratory of Developmental Genes and Human Disease, Ministry of Education, China.
Environ Toxicol Pharmacol. 2007 Nov;24(3):223-30. doi: 10.1016/j.etap.2007.05.009. Epub 2007 May 29.
In despite of the essential functions of zinc as trace element for humans, toxic effects will be pronounced while organisms are exposed to high levels of zinc. However, whether the multiple biological toxicities caused by zinc exposure could be transferred to progeny is still largely unknown. In the present study, we explored the model organism, Caenorhabditis elegans, to analyze the multiple toxicities from zinc exposure and their possibly transferable properties. Our results indicate that the zinc exposure could result in multiple biological defects by affecting the endpoints of life span, development, reproduction, locomotion behavior and chemotaxis plasticity. Zinc exposure could specially cause the appearance of uncoordinated (UNC) animals. In addition, Zn exposure could result in the stress responses in most of the tissues in exposed nematodes. Moreover, these phenotypic and behavioral toxicities could be transferred from zinc-exposed nematodes to their progeny. The fold changes of hsp16-2-gfp expression in embryos of progeny animals suggest that the zinc toxicity might be deposited in eggs of nematodes. We summarized these defects into two groups according to their transferable properties. Therefore, our data suggest that zinc exposure can result in multiple toxicities and these multiple biological defects can be largely transferred to progeny in C. elegans.
尽管锌作为微量元素对人体具有重要功能，但生物体暴露在高水平的锌中时，会产生明显的毒性作用。然而，锌暴露所导致的多种生物毒性是否可以传递给后代，在很大程度上仍然未知。在本研究中，我们利用模式生物秀丽隐杆线虫来分析锌暴露所导致的多种毒性及其可能的可传递特性。我们的研究结果表明，锌暴露可通过影响寿命、发育、繁殖、运动行为和趋化性可塑性等终点，导致多种生物学缺陷。锌暴露可特别导致线虫出现运动不协调（UNC）表型。此外，锌暴露会导致暴露线虫中大多数组织产生应激反应。此外，这些表型和行为毒性可以从暴露于锌的线虫传递给它们的后代。后代动物胚胎中 hsp16-2-gfp 表达的倍数变化表明，锌毒性可能沉积在线虫的卵中。我们根据其可传递特性将这些缺陷分为两类。因此，我们的数据表明，锌暴露可导致多种毒性，并且这些多种生物学缺陷在秀丽隐杆线虫中可在很大程度上传递给后代。
