Evaluation of the morphology and development of preantral ovarian follicles in mice submitted to a chronic diet of dietary supplementation with Pereskia aculeata Miller leaves

Ferreira, Alesandro SilvaFerreira, Francisco Glauber PeixotoNascimento, Etho Roberio MedeirosTetaping, Gildas MbemyaLima, Laritza Ferreira deFonseca, Said Gonçalves da CruzFigueiredo, José Ricardo deSousa, Daniel Freire deCelestino, Juliana Jales de Hollanda

This study aimed to investigate the effect of including mouse feed with different concentrations (5, 10, or 20%) of Pereskia aculeata Miller (PAM) leaves on the morphology and development of preantral ovarian follicles and ovarian stromal cell density. The oral toxicity was performed using repeated dose toxicity assays subdivided into experiments of 30 days and 90 days of treatment. After the experiments, the ovaries of each animal were collected and submitted to classical histology. At 30 and 90 days, there was an equivalent percentage of normal, primordial, and developing follicles (P > 0.05) between PAM treatments compared to the control. Regarding the different stages of follicular development, after 90 days, there was a higher percentage (P < 0.05) of developing follicles only in the control group compared to day 30. The PAM 5% treatment was the only one that affected the cell density in the stroma after 90 days of treatment. Thus, we observed that supplementing the diet with P. aculeata did not pose any risk concerning animal consumption; specifically, there were no toxic reproductive effects observed from adding Pereskia aculeata Miller to the mouse diet.(AU)

1. ovarian follicles
2. natural products
3. animal feed
4. reproductive toxicity
5. medicinal plants