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Updated: Dec 14, 2025

Long-term Behavioral and Reproductive Consequences of Embryonic Exposure to Low-dose Toxicants
Published on: March 6, 2018
Pubertal fenvalerate exposure impairs cognitive and behavioral development partially through down-regulating
Yang Yang1, Feng Zhan1, Ye-Cheng Wang1
1Department of Maternal, Child and Adolescent Health, School of Public Health, Anhui Medical University, Hefei, Anhui, China; Key Laboratory of Population Health Across Life Cycle, Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China; Anhui Provincial Key Laboratory of Population Health & Aristogenics, Hefei, Anhui, China.
Abstract:
Fenvalerate, a synthetic pyrethroid insecticide, is an environmental endocrine disruptor and neurodevelopmental toxicant. An early report found that pubertal exposure to high-dose fenvalerate impaired cognitive and behavioral development. Here, we aimed to further investigate the effect of pubertal exposure to low-dose fenvalerate on cognitive and behavioral development. Mice were orally administered with fenvalerate (0.2, 1.0 and 5.0 mg/kg) daily from postnatal day (PND) 28 to PND56. Learning and memory were assessed by Morris water maze. Anxiety-related activities were detected by open-field and elevated plus-maze. Increased anxiety activities were observed only in females exposed to fenvalerate. Spatial learning and memory were damaged only in females exposed to fenvalerate. Histopathology observed numerous scattered shrinking neurons and nuclear pyknosis in hippocampal CA1 region. Neuronal density was reduced in hippocampal CA1 region of fenvalerate-exposed mice. Mechanistically, hippocampal thyroid hormone receptor (TR)β1 was down-regulated in a dose-dependent manner in females. In addition, TRα1 was declined only in females exposed to 5.0 mg/kg fenvalerate. Taken together, these suggests that pubertal exposure to low-dose fenvalerate impairs cognitive and behavioral development in a gender-dependent manner. Hippocampal TR signaling may be, at least partially, involved in fenvalerate-induced impairment of cognitive and behavioral development.
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