Accumulation and endocrine disrupting effects of the flame retardant mixture Firemaster® 550 in rats: an exploratory assessment.

Firemaster® 550 (FM 550), a fire-retardant mixture used in foam-based products, was recently identified as a common contaminant in household dust. The chemical structures of its principle components suggest they have endocrine disrupting activity, but nothing is known about their physiological effects at environmentally relevant exposure levels. The goal of this exploratory study was to evaluate accumulation, metabolism and endocrine disrupting effects of FM 550 in rats exposed to 100 or 1000 µg/day across gestation and lactation. FM 550 components accumulated in tissues of exposed dams and offspring and induced phenotypic hallmarks associated with metabolic syndrome in the offspring. Effects included increased serum thyroxine levels and reduced hepatic carboxylesterease activity in dams, and advanced female puberty, weight gain, male cardiac hypertrophy, and altered exploratory behaviors in offspring. Results of this study are the first to implicate FM 550 as an endocrine disruptor and an obesogen at environmentally relevant levels.

Estrogen-like disruptive effects of dietary exposure to bisphenol A or 17α-ethinyl estradiol in CD1 mice.

Bisphenol A (BPA) is an endocrine disrupting chemical that is ubiquitous in wild and built environments. Due to variability in study design, the disruptive effects of BPA have proven difficult to experimentally replicate. This study was designed to assess the disruptive actions of dietary BPA exposure, while carefully controlling for known confounders. Parental CD1 mice were acclimated to defined diet containing BPA (0.03, 0.3, 3, 30, or 300 ppm) or 17α-ethinyl estradiol (EE; 0.0001, 0.001, and 0.01 ppm) and bred to produce progeny (F1) that were maintained through adulthood on the same diet as the parents. In F1 females, uterine weights were increased in all EE and the 30-ppm BPA-exposure groups, demonstrating model sensitivity and estrogen-like actions of BPA. In BPA-exposed females, no treatment-related differences were observed in parental reproductive function, or in the timing of puberty and metabolic function in female offspring. In F1 males, modest changes in body weight, adiposity and glucose tolerance, consistent with improved metabolic function, were observed. Associated with increased prolactin and increased circulating testosterone levels, balanopreputial separation was accelerated by 0.03 and 3.0 ppm BPA and anogenital distance at postnatal day 21 was increased in males by 0.03 ppm BPA. Sperm counts were also increased with 3.0 ppm BPA exposures. Overall, BPA was found to have modest, sex specific endocrine disruptive effects on a variety of end points below the established no observed adverse effect level. The dose response characteristics for many of the effects were nonmonotonic and not predictable from high-dose extrapolations.

Impacts of Bisphenol A and Ethinyl Estradiol on Male and Female CD-1 Mouse Spleen.

The endocrine disruptor bisphenol A (BPA) and the pharmaceutical 17α-ethinyl estradiol (EE) are synthetic chemicals with estrogen-like activities. Despite ubiquitous human exposure to BPA, and the wide-spread clinical use of EE as oral contraceptive adjuvant, the impact of these estrogenic endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) on the immune system is unclear. Here we report results of in vivo dose response studies that analyzed the histology and microstructural changes in the spleen of adult male and female CD-1 mice exposed to 4 to 40,000 µg/kg/day BPA or 0.02 to 2 µg/kg/day EE from conception until 12-14 weeks of age. Results of that analysis indicate that both BPA and EE have dose- and sex-specific impacts on the cellular and microanatomical structures of the spleens that reveal minor alterations in immunomodulatory and hematopoietic functions. These findings support previous studies demonstrating the murine immune system as a sensitive target for estrogens, and that oral exposures to BPA and EE can have estrogen-like immunomodulatory affects in both sexes.

Bisphenol A alters autonomic tone and extracellular matrix structure and induces sex-specific effects on cardiovascular function in male and female CD-1 mice.

The aim of this study was to determine whether bisphenol A (BPA) has adverse effects on cardiovascular functions in CD-1 mice and define sex-specific modes of BPA action in the heart. Dams and analyzed progeny were maintained on a defined diet containing BPA (0.03, 0.3, 3, 30, or 300 ppm) that resulted in BPA exposures from 4-5 to approximately 5000 µg/kg · d or a diet containing 17α-ethinyl estradiol (EE; ∼0.02, 0.2, and 0.15 µg/kg · d) as an oral bioavailable estrogen control. Assessment of electrocardiogram parameters using noninvasive methods found that ventricular functions in both male and female mice were not altered by either BPA or EE. However, exposure-related changes in the rates of ventricular contraction, suggestive of a shift in sympathovagal balance of heart rate control toward increased parasympathetic activity, were detected in males. Decreased systolic blood pressure was observed in males exposed to BPA above 5 µg/kg · d and in females from the highest BPA exposure group. Morphometric histological measures revealed sexually dimorphic changes in the composition of the cardiac collagen extracellular matrix, increases in fibrosis, and evidence of modest exposure-related remodeling. Experiments using the α-selective adrenergic agonist phenylephrine found that BPA enhanced reflex bradycardia in females, but not males, revealed that BPA and EE exposure sex specifically altered the sympathetic regulation of the baroreflex circuits. Increased sensitivity to the cardiotoxic effects of the ß-adrenergic agonist isoproterenol was observed in BPA- and EE-exposed females. This effect was not observed in males, in which BPA or EE exposures were protective of isoproterenol-induced ischemic damage and hypertrophy. The results of RNA sequence analysis identified significant sex-specific changes in gene expression in response to BPA that were consistent with the observed exposure-related phenotypic changes in the collagenous and noncollagenous extracellular matrix, cardiac remodeling, altered autonomic responses, changes in ion channel and transporter functions, and altered glycolytic and lipid metabolism.

Strain specific induction of pyometra and differences in immune responsiveness in mice exposed to 17α-ethinyl estradiol or the endocrine disrupting chemical bisphenol A.

Pyometra is an inflammatory disease of the uterus that can be caused by chronic exposure to estrogens. It is unknown whether weakly estrogenic endocrine disruptors can cause pyometra. We investigated whether dietary exposures to the estrogenic endocrine disruptor bisphenol A (BPA) induced pyometra. Pyometra did not occur in CD1 mice exposed to different dietary doses of BPA ranging from 4.1 to >4000µg/kg-d or 17α-ethinyl estradiol (EE; 1.2 to >150µg/kg-d). In the C57BL/6 strain, pyometra occurred in the 15µg/kg-d EE and 33µg/kg-d BPA treatment groups. At the effective concentration of BPA, histological analysis revealed pathological alterations of uterine morphology associated with a >5.3-fold increase in macrophage numbers in non-pyometra uteri of C57BL/6 mice exposed to BPA. These results suggest that BPA enhances immune responsiveness of the uterus and that heightened responsiveness in C57BL/6 females is related to increased susceptibility to pyometra.

Inhibition of VEGFR2 prevents DMBA-induced mammary tumor formation.

Preinvasive mammary pathologies in humans and rat chemical carcinogenesis model systems have an increased microvascular density relative to normal tissue. This suggests the possibility of preventing invasive breast cancer by inhibiting angiogenesis. Vascular endothelial cell growth factor (VEGF) is a potent angiogenic growth factor, commonly involved in tumor-induced angiogenesis. Here, we show that both VEGF and VEGFR2 expression increase with histological progression to invasive disease in the rat 7,12-dimethylbenz[a]anthracene (DMBA) model. Other VEGF receptors, VEGFR1, neuropilin 1 and neuropilin 2, are constitutively expressed throughout progression. To examine whether VEGF signaling is functionally relevant to tumor-induced endothelial tubule formation in vitro and for tumor formation in vivo, we utilized the VEGFR2 inhibitor, ZD6474. In vitro endothelial cell tubulogenesis induced by isolated mammary organoids or carcinoma in situ from DMBA-treated rats is inhibited by ZD6474, in a dose-dependent fashion. The administration of ZD6474 to DMBA-treated rats inhibits the formation of atypical ductal hyperplasia and carcinoma in situ by greater than 95% (P < 0.05), when administered 1 week or 6 weeks post-DMBA initiation. Invasive disease was absent in all ZD6474 cohorts. These data support the hypothesis that progression of DMBA-induced preinvasive mammary pathologies to palpable disease requires angiogenesis via a VEGF-dependent mechanism.

TNP-470 inhibits 7,12-dimethylbenz[a]anthracene-induced mammary tumor formation when administered before the formation of carcinoma in situ but is not additive with tamoxifen.

In many women pathologic lesions, such as hyperplasia and carcinoma in situ, precede invasive breast cancer. We have shown that tissue vascularity increases with histologic progression to invasive disease. Similarly, in the well-characterized 7,12-dimethylbenz[a]anthracene (DMBA) model of mammary tumorigenesis, preinvasive lesions exhibit increased vascularity with progression. Using this model we asked whether inhibition of angiogenesis would block progression and if so, at which stage. We treated rats with DMBA followed by the potent angiogenic inhibitor, TNP-470, and/or tamoxifen starting 1 day or 6 weeks later. Histopathology and in vitro angiogenic potential of mammary organoids were evaluated 3 months after DMBA. All statistical tests were two-sided. Early TNP-470 and tamoxifen treatment inhibited the formation of carcinoma in situ (p < 0.001) and invasive disease (p < 0.001). However, their effects were not additive, despite their unique mechanisms of action. TNP-470 administration begun at the time of microscopic carcinoma in situ formation was unable to prevent the further development of carcinoma in situ or invasive breast cancer, whereas tamoxifen was highly effective (p = 0.001). There was no added benefit of combining TNP-470 and tamoxifen. TNP-470 therapy, unlike tamoxifen, did not inhibit the angiogenic potential of DMBA-treated normal mammary organoids, supporting its lack of a direct effect on the epithelium. These data provide proof-in-principle that inhibition of angiogenesis early in mammary tumorigenesis prevents mammary tumor formation in a hormone-sensitive model, indicating that angiogenesis is a potential target for cancer chemoprevention. Interactions with other chemopreventive strategies and the timing of administration must be thoroughly examined in vivo.