Antioxidant activity of Coridius chinensis extracts on manganese‐induced testicular damage in rats

Abstract

Coridius chinensis (C. chinensis) is a traditional Chinese medicine that has been used to treat pain, erectile dysfunction, and other diseases. Our previous study demonstrated that manganese‐induced reproductive damage was partially rescued by a medium dose of C. chinensis treatment in rat. However, the underlying mechanism is unknown. In this study, we found that the weight of reproductive organs and the sperm count in manganese‐exposed rat were partially rescued by C. chinensis extracts (CcE) treatment. The number of apoptotic cells was significantly decreased and the expression of malondialdehyde, cytochrome c, and caspase‐3 in manganese‐exposed rats was significantly decreased after high dose of CcE treatment. Further studies revealed that the activity of superoxide dismutase, total antioxidant capacity, and glutathione peroxidase enzymes was significantly increased in testis tissues and serum of manganese‐exposed rats with high dose of CcE treatment. Taken together, the results of this study suggest that CcE inhibits the Mn2+‐induced apoptosis in testes by inducing the activity of antioxidants.

Protective effects of Coridius chinensis extracts on rat reproductive damage induced by manganese

“…In addition, our previous studies have shown that the Mn 2+ exposure decreased the activity of antioxidants and increased the level of ROS (Liu et al, 2019 ), which was consistent with other previous studies (Khosravi et al, 2019 ; Liu et al, 2013 ). It was also reported that the disruption of paracellular permeability induced by oxidative stress was prevented by tyrosine–kinase inhibitors in vitro (Rao et al, 1997 ).…”

“…Testes were fixed in 4% (v/v) paraformaldehyde, dehydrated in ethanol and embedded in paraffin, followed by preparing 5μm thickness sections and mounting on slides for haematoxylin and eosin. The immunohistochemical procedures were conducted according to Liu et al ( 2019 ). The sections were dewaxed, hydrated and performed using a Vectastain ABC kit (Burlingame, CA) as recommended.…”

“…The environmental toxicants are accumulated in the Sertoli cells by junction‐associated ‘pores’ and/or drug transporters, which in turn lead to decreased sperm count and motility, and eventually cause spermatogenic dysfunction (Cheng, 2014 ; Cheng & Mruk, 2012 ; Gao et al, 2015 ; Siu, Mruk, et al, 2009 ; Su et al, 2012 ). Several other studies have demonstrated that environmental toxicants exposure also caused decreased activity of superoxide dismutase and catalase, and increased content of nitric oxide, malondialdehyde (MDA) and reactive oxygen species (ROS; Dkhil et al, 2016 ; Kong et al, 2019 ; Koriem et al, 2013 ; Liu et al, 2019 ). These studies suggested that environmental toxicants were important factors in oxidative stress, and oxidative stress may be an important factor in spermatogenic cell apoptosis.…”

“…Our previous study found that sperm count and serum testosterone level were increased, and sexual capacity was also improved after treatment with C. chinensis in rats exposed to Mn 2+ (He et al, 2016 ). Furthermore, our recent study found that C. chinensis can effectively improve the activity of antioxidant enzymes and reduced the product of lipid peroxidation, MDA (Liu et al, 2019 ). We also found that C. chinensis can exert an antioxidant capacity by inhibiting oxidative stress and cell apoptosis caused by Mn 2+ exposure in testes.…”

Pomegranate Seeds Extract Possesses a Protective Effect against Tramadol-Induced Testicular Toxicity in Experimental Rats

“…On the other hand, the cotreated groups have comparable apoptotic cell numbers to controls and normal spermatids' chromatin. Previous reports revealed that extracts from plants with antioxidant activity can reduce the apoptotic of germ cells caused by chemical toxicity [64,65]. Similarly, pomegranate seed extract prevented germ cell apoptosis, possibly by modulating the ROS/Nrf2/p53 signaling cascade as previously described [66][67][68].…”