Toxicological interaction of arsenate in immature male albino rats: evidence of dose dependent response

The objective of this work was to study the effect of arsenic (As) on body weight gain organs weights, blood profile and hormones of thyroid gland in rats. Forty immature spraque dawely male rats were divided equally into four groups. one group, functioned as control, was given redistilled drinking water and the other groups recived arsenic as sodium arsenate in drinking water with different doses (100, 50 or 25 mg/L). Body weights were recorded by intervals. After four weeks, all animals were sacrificed and liver, kidney, testes, slpeen, thyroid and adrenal glands were weighed and the tissues were sampled and analyzed for arsentic accumulation. Hematological parameters were investigated and serum free thyroxine (FT4), free triodothyronine (FT3) and thyrotropine (TSH) were determined. The results of the current study showed reduction in body weight gain/day, the magnitude of the reduction of growth rate (P<0.01) was detected in the group of rats that reciverd the highest dose of arsenic compared to the control rats, liver kidney, testes and spleen weights were significantly decreased (P<0.01), while significant increases (P<0.01) in weights of thyroid and adrenal glands were recorded. The present data indicated that as tended to accumulate in the previous tissues, but the concentration of as in thyroid tissue was found to be the significantly increased (P<0.01)manly in the group of rats that recived the hightest dose of arsenate, that may positively correlated with the variation in pituitary-thyroid axis