International Journal Of Biology and Biological Sciences Vol. 4(1), pp. 001-018, April 2015 ISSN 2327-3062 ©2015 Academe Research Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Genotoxicity and ultrastructural studies of the effect of cisplatin on the cortex of kidney of albino male mice

Azza A. Attia¹*, Cecil A. Matta¹ and Hanan A. Khaliffa²

¹Zoology Department, Faculty of Science, Alexandria University, Egypt.

²Faculty of Science, Omar Elmokhtar University, Lybia.

*Corresponding author. E-mail: azzzaatia@hotmail.com.

Accepted 11 September, 2014

Abstract

Cisplatin is still a frequently used chemotherapeutic agent, despite its frequent adverse effects, including nephrotoxicity. The present work was done to investigate its harmful effects on the tissue kidney of the male mice. Two groups of mice were injected intraperitoneally with 0.5 ml cisplatin at doses of 0.15 and 0.3 mg/kg BW, two times/week, for four consecutive weeks. The third group animals was injected with 0.5 ml saline solution as a vehicle, and considered as a control. Chromosomal aberrations test, DNA assay and ultrastructural studies in the tissue of kidney were evaluated. The results revealed that depending on the dose response, there was an increase in the mortality rate and decrease in the body weights of experimental mice treated with the two dose levels of cisplatin. The chromosomal aberrations include deletion, centric fusion and stickiness, indicating the positive clastogenic effect of cisplatin. Severe DNA damage was more prominent in the tissue kidney of mice administered with 0.3 mg/kg BW cisplatin. Histologically, cisplatin caused severe structural alterations including destruction in the renal tubular cells, and presence of focal hemorrhage in between the tubules. The glomeruli exhibited shrinkage of the glomerular tuft and dilatation in the urinary spaces. At the ultrastructural level, severe atrophy in the glomeruli, rupture of Bowman’s capsule and dilatation in the urinary space were observed. At the proximal conpluted tubules, the basal infoldings appeared short and flattened, and large vacuoles were noticed in the cytoplasm. Mostly, the nuclei were pyknotic, the mitochondria were pleomorphic, and there was an increase in the primary and secondary lysosomes. In the distal convoluted tubule cells, the nuclei were mostly pyknotic.

Key words: Cisplatin, glomeruli, genotoxicity, renal tubules, chromosomal aberrations, nephrotoxicity.