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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Toxicol.
Sec. Neurotoxicology
Volume 6 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/ftox.2024.1397477
This article is part of the Research Topic Women in Neurotoxicology 2023 View all articles

Decreased activity in zebrafish larvae exposed to glyphosate-based herbicides during development -potential mediation by glucocorticoid receptor

Provisionally accepted
Stefan Spulber Stefan Spulber 1Luã Tainã Costa Reis Luã Tainã Costa Reis 1Petru I. Alexe Petru I. Alexe 1Sandra Ceccatelli Sandra Ceccatelli 2*
  • 1 Karolinska Institutet (KI), Solna, Stockholm, Sweden
  • 2 Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet (KI), Solna, Sweden

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Glyphosate-based herbicides (GBH) are a widely used group of pesticides that have glyphosate (GLY) as main active compound and are used to control a wide range of weeds. Experimental and epidemiological studies point to neurotoxicity and endocrine disruption as main toxic effects. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of developmental exposure to GLY and GBH on locomotor behavior, and the possible contribution of GR-mediated signaling. We used zebrafish (Danio rerio) larvae in a continuous exposure regimen to GLY or GBH in the rearing medium. Alongside TL wildtype, we used a mutant line carrying a mutation in the GR which prevents the GR from binding to DNA (grs357), as well as a transgenic strain expressing a variant of enhanced green fluorescent protein (d4eGFP) controlled by a promoter carrying multiple GR response elements (SR4G). We found that acute exposure to GBH, but not GLY, activates GR-mediated signaling. Using a continuous developmental exposure regime, we show that wildtype larvae exposed to GBH display decreased spontaneous activity and attenuated response to environmental stimuli, a pattern of alteration similar to the one observed in grs357 mutant larvae. In addition, developmental exposure to GBH has virtually no effects on the behavior of grs357 mutant larvae. Taken together, our data indicate that developmental exposure to GBH has more pronounced effects than GLY on behavior at 5 dpf, and that interference with GR-mediated signaling may have a relevant contribution.

    Keywords: glyphosate, stress, glucocorticoid, Developmental neurotoxicity (DNT), Endocrine discruptors

    Received: 07 Mar 2024; Accepted: 19 Jun 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Spulber, Tainã Costa Reis, Alexe and Ceccatelli. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Sandra Ceccatelli, Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet (KI), Solna, 17177, Sweden

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