2005 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
Toxic assessment of environmental contaminant chemicals using DNA microarrray
| Project/Area Number |
15390183
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
Hygiene
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| Research Institution | Tohoku University |
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Principal Investigator |
KAMEO Satomi Tohoku University, Graduate School of Medicine, Research Associate, 大学院・医学系研究科, 助手 (40312558)
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| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
NAKAI Kunihiko Tohoku University, Graduate School of Medicine, Associate Professor, 大学院・医学系研究科, 助教授 (00291336)
SATOH Hiroshi Tohoku University, Graduate School of Medicine, Professor, 大学院・医学系研究科, 教授 (40125571)
IWAHASHI Hotoshi AIST, Human Stress Signal Research Center, Vice Director, ヒューマンストレスシグナル研究センター, 副研究センター長 (60356540)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2003 – 2005
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| Keywords | microarray / gene expression / environmental pollution / chemicals / methylmercury / PCB / brain / neurotoxicity |
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| Research Abstract |
We conducted the screening of gene expression under exposures of environmental contaminant chemicals in order to detect biological response against these chemicals. This study deals with gene expression against methylmercury exposure, especially low-dose, perinatal periods using DNA microarray.
Methylmercury is known as neurotoxicant especially in the development period. MeHg enters the aquatic food chain to become the predominant dietary source of mercury in humans. The highest levels of MeHg are found in predatory fish and sea mammals. As the exposure level is low, it is necessary to consider the various confounding factors. In this study, we choose the polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) as confounding factor, and investigated the effect of combined exposure to methylmercury and PCBs. Because main sources of human methylmercury exposure are fish, bioconcentrated PCBs exposure which have strong neurotoxicity also occurs. These chemicals are ingested mainly through fish consumption, but little is known about the hazardous effects.
In this study, we investigated the gene expression on mouse brain of the MeHg exposed group, the PCBs exposed group, or, co-exposure to MeHg and PCBs during perinatal periods using DNA microarray technique. We applied extracted total RNA sample from brain of exposed animals to the DNA microarray. Then we carried out analysis of plenty of data according to bioinformatics methodologies. We classified the categories of expression genes and characterizing the gene expression profiling under the tree groups ; MeHg exposure group, PCB exposure group, MeHg-PCB co-exposure group.
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