Hepatic susceptibility to oxidative damage after repeated concomitant exposure to aspartame and aflatoxin B1 in rats

Abstract

The potential interactions among food additives/contaminants and the consequences to biological systems is a topic that is rarely addressed in scientific literature. Thus, the current study investigated if the combined administration of ASP and AFB₁ would impair hepatic and renal oxidative status. Male Wistar rats received during 14 days once a day ASP (75 mg/Kg) and/or AFB₁ (250 µg/Kg) through intragastric route. At the end of experimental protocol, samples of liver and kidneys were collected for assessing biochemical markers of oxidative status. In the hepatic tissue, the treatment with a single substance (ASP or AFB₁) caused an increase in TBARS levels, and a reduction in non-enzymatic antioxidant defenses (Vit C and NPSH levels and FRAP test). In the kidneys, TBARS levels were increased only in the group that received ASP + AFB₁. The association reduced NPSH content, while the treatment with AFB₁ reduced the FRAP levels. GST and CAT activities were increased in all treatments. Overall, ASP and AFB1 association presented higher toxic effects to the tissues. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study demonstrating that the associated use of both ASP and AFB1 induces more extensive injuries in comparison to the effects caused by each one alone. Therefore, these data demonstrated that concomitant exposure to ASP and AFB₁ potentiated their oxidative damage in hepatic tissue, suggesting that this organ is particularly sensitive to the toxic action induced by these substances.

Keywords:

• Artificial sweeteners
• mycotoxins
• oxidative stress
• liver
• rodents

Author contributions

All authors substantially contributed to develop this study, by discussion and commenting results. The final version of this manuscript was approved. SOUTO, N. S.: Methodology, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing, Visualization, Conceptualization; DASSI, M.: Methodology, Data curation, Investigation; BRAGA, A. C. M.: Methodology, Data curation, Investigation; ROSA, E. V. F.: Methodology, Data curation, Conceptualization; FIGHERA, M. R.: Data curation, Writing - review & editing, Conceptualization; ROYES, L. F. F.: Data curation, Writing - review & editing, Conceptualization; OLIVEIRA, M. S.: Methodology, Data curation, Writing - review & editing, Conceptualization; SARI, M. H. M.: Data curation, Investigation, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing; FURIAN, A. F.: Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing, Supervision, Funding acquisition.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing for financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Additional information

Funding

Research supported by Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul (FAPERGS grant#16/2551–0000365-3). M.D., L.F.F.R, M.R.F., M.S.O., and A.F.F. (grant #304824/2016–0 and 304825/2020–4) are the recipients of CNPq fellowships; A.C.M.B., N.S.S. and M.H.M.S are the recipients of Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) fellowships. This study was financed in part by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - Brasil (CAPES) - Finance Code 001".