Department of Biomedical Sciences, School of Biosciences and Technology, Vellore Institute of Technology (VIT), Vellore 632014, India.
Department of Biomedical Sciences, School of Biosciences and Technology, Vellore Institute of Technology (VIT), Vellore 632014, India.
Ecotoxicol Environ Saf. 2023 Mar 1;252:114614. doi: 10.1016/j.ecoenv.2023.114614. Epub 2023 Feb 6.
Arsenic toxicity is one of the most trending reasons for several malfunctions, particularly reproductive toxicity. The exact mechanism of arsenic poisoning is a big question mark. Exposure to arsenic reduces sperm count, impairs fertilization, and causes inflammation and genotoxicity through interfering with autophagy, epigenetics, ROS generation, downregulation of essential protein expression, metabolite changes, and hampering several signaling cascades, particularly by the alteration of NF-ĸB pathway. This work tries to give a clear idea about the different aspects of arsenic resulting in male reproductive complications, often leading to infertility. The first part of this article explains the implications of arsenic poisoning and the crosstalk of the NF-ĸB pathway in male reproductive toxicity. Silymarin is a bioactive compound that exerts anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory properties and has demonstrated hopeful outcomes in several cancers, including colon cancer, breast cancer, and skin cancer, by downregulating the hyperactive NF-ĸB pathway. The next half of this article thus sheds light on silymarin's therapeutic potential in inhibiting the NF-ĸB signaling cascade, thus offering protection against arsenic-induced male reproductive toxicity.
砷中毒是导致多种功能障碍的最常见原因之一，尤其是生殖毒性。砷中毒的确切机制是一个大问号。暴露于砷会减少精子数量，损害受精，并通过干扰自噬、表观遗传学、ROS 生成、下调必需蛋白表达、代谢物变化以及干扰几个信号级联反应，特别是通过改变 NF-ĸB 途径，引起炎症和遗传毒性。这项工作试图阐明砷导致男性生殖并发症的不同方面，这些并发症通常导致不育。本文的第一部分解释了砷中毒的影响以及 NF-ĸB 途径在男性生殖毒性中的相互作用。水飞蓟素是一种具有抗癌和抗炎特性的生物活性化合物，通过下调过度活跃的 NF-ĸB 途径，已在几种癌症中显示出有希望的结果，包括结肠癌、乳腺癌和皮肤癌。因此，本文的下一半内容重点介绍了水飞蓟素在抑制 NF-ĸB 信号级联反应方面的治疗潜力，从而为对抗砷诱导的男性生殖毒性提供保护。
