The effect of intrauterine alcohol exposure on postnatal skeletal development in Sprague Dawley rats
Date
2019
Authors
Pillay, Diana Subramony
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
The detrimental effects of intrauterine alcohol exposure are well known, however, many women around the world continue to drink alcohol while pregnant. The deleterious effects include neurological deficiencies, intrauterine and postnatal growth retardation as well as craniofacial and skeletal deformities in addition to short stature and osteoporosis, with high propensity to fracture. The central nervous system disturbances related to intrauterine alcohol exposure are intensively studied in the scientific literature, with relatively scanty data on the postnatal skeletal development in children exposed to alcohol during gestation.
The few studies on how intrauterine alcohol exposure affects skeletal development are on fetuses and newly born animals, mostly rodents. There is debate as to whether gestational alcohol exposure effects on the skeletal system persist into adulthood or whether there is skeletal recovery in postnatal life. Therefore, this study aims to investigate whether the effects of prenatal alcohol exposure persist through postnatal life in rats (3 and 12-week-old) regarding long bone (humerus and femur) development and strength.
To achieve our aim, animals were time-mated (n=15), then randomly allocated to three groups; ethanol group (n=6), saline controls (n=6) and untreated controls (n=3). The appearance of a vaginal plug was considered day one of gestation; on this this day treatment was started. The former two groups were treated with 0.015ml/g of 25.2% ethanol and 0.9% saline for the first 19 days of gestation, respectively. The treatment was through oral gavage. The untreated group received no treatment. Once born, two pups from each dam were used so that the ethanol and saline control group had 12 pups each while the untreated control had 6 pups.
Bilateral humeri and femora were harvested then fixed in 10% buffered formalin before scanning using a 3D-μCT scanner (Nikon XTH 225L) to analyse trabecular thickness, number, and spacing were. The left proximal and distal extremities of the humeri and femora at 3 weeks of age were processed for routine histology. These sections were stained with Haematoxylin and Eosin (H&E) for normal morphology and immunolabelled with the anti-Ki-67 antibody for cell proliferation as well as immunolocalization of chondrocytes
Description
A Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in accomplishment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.Johannesburg, 2019
Keywords
Citation
Pillay, Diana Subramony, The effect of intrauterine alcohol exposure on postnatal skeletal development in Sprague Dawley rats, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, <http://hdl.handle.net/10539/29877>