The Administration of Cadmium for 2, 3 and 4 Months Causes a Loss of Recognition Memory, Promotes Neuronal Hypotrophy and Apoptosis in the Hippocampus of Rats

• Published in: Neurochemical research Vol. 44; no. 2; pp. 485 - 497
• Main Authors: Pulido, Guadalupe, Treviño, Samuel, Brambila, Eduardo, Vazquez-Roque, Ruben, Moreno-Rodriguez, Albino, Peña Rosas, Ulises, Moran-Perales, Jose Luis, Handal Silva, Anhabella, Guevara, Jorge, Flores, Gonzalo, Diaz, Alfonso
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.02.2019; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Apoptosis; Biochemistry; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Biomedicine; Brain; Cadmium; Carcinogens; Caspase; Caspase-3; Cell Biology; Cell death; Central nervous system; Cognitive ability; Cognitive tasks; Dendritic spines; Dentate gyrus; Exposure; Heavy metals; Hippocampus; Human populations; Immunoreactivity; Memory; Morphology; Neurochemistry; Neurodegeneration; Neurology; Neurons; Neurosciences; Occupational health; Original Paper; Oxidative stress; Quality of life; Recognition; Structure-function relationships; Toxicity; Dendritic spines; Golgi–Cox; CA1–CA3–DG hippocampus; Caspases; Cell death; The novel object recognition
• ISSN: 0364-3190; 1573-6903
• DOI: 10.1007/s11064-018-02703-2

Cadmium (Cd) is a toxic metal and classified as a carcinogen whose exposure could affect the function of the central nervous system. There are studies that suggest that Cd promotes neurodegeneration in different regions of the brain, particularly in the hippocampus. It is proposed that its mechanism of toxicity maybe by an oxidative stress pathway, which modifies neuronal morphology and causes the death of neurons and consequently affecting cognitive tasks. However, this mechanism is not yet clear. The aim of the present work was to study the effect of Cd administration on recognition memory for 2, 3 and 4 months, neuronal morphology and immunoreactivity for caspase-3 and 9 in rat hippocampi. The results show that the administration of Cd decreased recognition memory. Likewise, it caused the dendritic morphology of the CA1, CA3 and dentate gyrus regions of the hippocampus to decrease with respect to the time of administration of this heavy metal. In addition, we observed a reduction in the density of dendritic spines as well as an increase in the immunoreactivity of caspase-3 and 9 in the same hippocampal regions of the animals treated with Cd. These results suggest that Cd affects the structure and function of the neurons of the hippocampus, which contribute to the deterioration of recognition memory. Our results suggest that the exposure to Cd represents a critical health problem, which if not addressed quickly, could cause much more serious problems in the quality of life of the human population, as well as in the environment in which they develop.