title: Chlormequat chloride retards rat embryo growth in vitro.
abstract: Chlormequat chloride is the most widely used plant growth regulator in agriculture to promote sturdier growth of grain crops by avoidance of lodging. Therefore, human exposure to chlormequat chloride is very common, but its developmental toxicity has not been studied. Thus, we investigated the developmental toxicity of chlormequat chloride by applying rat whole embryo culture (WEC) model, limb bud micromass culture and 3T3 fibroblast cytotoxicity test. Chlormequat chloride at 150μg/ml (0.93mM) retarded the rat embryo growth without causing significant morphological malformations and at 500μg/ml (3.1mM) caused both retardation and morphological malformation of the embryos. However, the proliferation and differentiation of limb bud cells were not affected by chlormequat chloride at as high as up to 1000μg/ml (6.2mM) applied. This concentration of chlormequat chloride did not affect the cell viability as examined by 3T3 fibroblast cytotoxicity test either, suggesting that cellular toxicity may not play a role in chlormequat induced inhibition of rat embryo growth. Collectively, our results demonstrated that chlormequat chloride may affect embryo growth and development without inhibiting cell viability.
authors.affiliation: Department of Toxicology, School of Public Health, Peking University, Beijing Key Laboratory of Toxicological Research and Risk Assessment for Food Safety, Beijing, 100191, PR China.
authors.forename: Bayindala
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Xiagedeer
authors.affiliation: Department of Toxicology, School of Public Health, Peking University, Beijing Key Laboratory of Toxicological Research and Risk Assessment for Food Safety, Beijing, 100191, PR China.
authors.forename: Shuang
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: Department of Toxicology, School of Public Health, Peking University, Beijing Key Laboratory of Toxicological Research and Risk Assessment for Food Safety, Beijing, 100191, PR China.
authors.forename: Yingjuan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Toxicology, School of Public Health, Peking University, Beijing Key Laboratory of Toxicological Research and Risk Assessment for Food Safety, Beijing, 100191, PR China. Electronic address: whao@bjmu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Weidong
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Hao
mesh_terms: D016475:3T3 Cells; D000818:Animals; D002470:Cell Survival / Q000187:drug effects; D002716:Chlormequat / Q000633:toxicity*; D004622:Embryo, Mammalian / Q000187:drug effects*; D047108:Embryonic Development / Q000187:drug effects*; D005552:Forelimb / Q000196:embryology; D006614:Hindlimb / Q000196:embryology; D018878:Limb Buds / Q000187:drug effects; D051379:Mice; D010937:Plant Growth Regulators / Q000633:toxicity*; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D013723:Teratogens / Q000633:toxicity*
chemical_list: D010937:Plant Growth Regulators; D013723:Teratogens; D002716:Chlormequat
keywords: Chlormequat chloride; Cytotoxicity; Embryotoxicity; Micromass culture; Whole embryo culture