Assessment of the effects of single and combined exposure to microplastics and environmental pollutants on the nervous system and neurobehavior

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In this first year, I aimed to investigate the effect of oral administration of polystyrene nanoplastics (PS-NPs) on brain functions and behaviors in rats. Five-week-old Sprague Dawley male rats were given 45 nm PS-NPs (Polysciences, Warrington, PA, USA) or sterile water by oral administration at doses 10 mg/kg or 50 mg/kg thrice per week for four weeks. At the age of 9-week-old, behavioral tests such as open field test (OFT), novel object recognition (NOR) test, elevated plus maze (EPM) test and nest construction (NC) test were performed. The hippocampus was collected to detect neuronal activity indicators, synaptic proteins, inflammatory cytokines, neurotrophic factors, glial markers using real-time RT-PCR and immunohistochemical analyses. Hight dose PS-NPs-exposed rats showed anxiety-like behavior and cognitive deficit. Neuronal activity indicators (cFos, early growth response 1), synaptic proteins (PSD-95, synaptophysin), neurotrophic factors (BDNF, NGF) were significantly lower whereas inflammatory cytokines (IL1-beta, TNF-alpha) and microglial marker (Iba1) were significantly higher in high dose PS-NPs-exposed rats. Our results indicate oral exposure to PS-NPs induced learning, memory impairment and anxiety-like behavior by altering neuron-glia-immune cells interaction at synaptic regions in the rat hippocampus.