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Impaired primordial follicle assembly in offspring ovaries from zearalenone-exposed mothers involves reduced mitochondrial activity and altered epigenetics in oocytes

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Abstract

Previous works have shown that zearalenone (ZEA), as an estrogenic pollutant, has adverse effects on mammalian folliculogenesis. In the present study, we found that prolonged exposure of female mice to ZEA around the end of pregnancy caused severe impairment of primordial follicle formation in the ovaries of newborn mice and altered the expression of many genes in oocytes as revealed by single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq). These changes were associated with morphological and molecular alterations of mitochondria, increased autophagic markers in oocytes, and epigenetic changes in the ovaries of newborn mice from ZEA-exposed mothers. The latter increased expression of HDAC2 deacetylases was leading to decreased levels of H3K9ac and H4K12ac. Most of these modifications were relieved when the expression of  Hdac2 in newborn ovaries was reduced by RNA interference during in vitro culture in the presence of ZEA. Such changes were also alleviated in offspring ovaries from mothers treated with both ZEA and the coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), which is known to be able to restore mitochondrial activities. We concluded that impaired mitochondrial activities in oocytes caused by ZEA are at the origin of metabolic alterations that modify the expression of genes controlling autophagy and primordial follicle assembly through changes in epigenetic histones.

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Availability of data and materials

All primary data and material in the manuscript are available upon reasonable request. The ovarian single-cell RNA sequencing data reported in this paper is NCBI GEO: GSE134339 and GSA: CRA003017.

Abbreviations

ACA:

Acetyl coenzyme A

BW:

Body weight

CA:

Citric acid

CoQ10:

Coenzyme Q10

DEG:

Differential expression gene

E17.5:

Embryonic 17.5 day

E2:

17β-Estradiol

ETC:

Electron transport chain

GEMs:

Gel bead emulsions

HAT:

Histone acetyltransferase

HDAC2:

Histone deacetylase 2

HRP:

Horseradish peroxidase

IF:

Immunofluorescence

IHC:

Immunohistochemistry

KAT2A:

Lysine acetyltransferase 2A

MMP:

Mitochondrial membrane potential

OR:

Ovarian reserve

PCOS:

Polycystic ovarian syndrome

PD0:

Postnatal 0 day

PF:

Primordial follicle

PFA:

Paraformaldehyde

PVDF:

Polyvinylidene fluoride membrane

RT-qPCR:

Real-time quantitative PCR

RNAi:

RNA interference

ROS:

Reactive oxygen species

scRNA-seq:

Single-cell RNA sequencing

TCA:

Tricarboxylic acid

tSNE:

T-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding

TEM:

Transmission electron microscopy

UMAP:

Uniform manifold approximation and projection

ZEA:

Zearalenone

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Funding

This work was supported by Science & Technology Fund Planning Projects of Qingdao City (21-1-4-ny-7-nsh), Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province (ZR202103020217) and Taishan Scholar Foundation of Shandong Province (ts20190946).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Life Sciences, Key Laboratory of Animal Reproduction and Biotechnology in Universities of Shandong, Qingdao Agricultural University, Qingdao, 266109, China

    Yan-Qin Feng, Jun-Jie Wang, Ming-Hao Li, Yu Tian, Lan Li & Wei Shen

  2. Qingdao Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Qingdao, 266100, China

    Ai-Hong Zhao

  3. Department of Biomedicine and Prevention, University of Rome Tor Vergata, 00133, Rome, Italy

    Massimo De Felici

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  1. Yan-Qin Feng
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  6. Lan Li
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Contributions

WS, LL and J-JW designed the study. Y-QF, M-HL performed the experiments for this work. YT analyzed the single-cell RNA sequence data in this study. Y-QF, J-JW and MDeF wrote the manuscript. LL and A-HZ provided funding. All the authors contributed to discussion of the study and revision of this manuscript.

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Correspondence to Wei Shen.

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C57/BL6 mouse breeding conditions and treatment methods in this experiment strictly complied with the Animal Care and Ethical Committee of Qingdao Agricultural University.

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Supplementary Fig. 1

Cell types identified in newborn mouse ovaries. (a) Subdivision of the ovarian cell populations into 18 clusters by tSNE analysis. (b) Heatmap of the top 10 marker genes of each cell cluster. (c) Violin plots of the marker genes of the six different ovarian cell populations. (d) Subdivision of the ovarian cell populations into 18 clusters by UMAP analysis. (e) Classification of the ovarian cell population into six different types by UMAP. Supplementary Fig. 2 Subdivision of the oocyte clustering according to the PF formation stages and effects of ZEA on MMP in the ovaries. (a) Subdivision of the oocyte populations into 10 clusters (upper) distributed within pre-, early- and late-follicle stages (below) by tSNE analysis. (b) Heatmap of top 5 marker genes of three PF formation stages. (c) Measure of the MMP in PD3 offspring ovaries by JC-1 dye; MMP is indicated by a decrease in the red (PE-A, JC-1 aggregates)/green (FITC-A, monomeric JC-1) fluorescence intensity ratio; no difference between CTRL and ZEA groups of PD3 ovaries was observed. All analyses were repeated at least three times on different samples. Data are shown as mean ± SD (*P < 0.05; **P < 0.01). Supplementary Fig. 3 ZEA treatment impairs mitochondrial function in newborn mouse oocytes. (a) Enrichment analysis of 134 down-regulated genes (upper) and 194 up-regulated genes (below) in PD0 offspring ovaries from ZEA-exposed mothers. (b) Enrichment analysis of 210 down-regulated genes (upper) and 196 up-regulated genes in PD3 offspring ovaries (below). Supplementary Fig. 4 ZEA treatment affects the expression of mitochondrial electron transport chain related genes in mouse oocytes. Violin plots show the expression level of DEGs that encoding mitochondrial electron transport chain subunits in the four experimental group. Supplementary Fig. 5 Effects of ZEA on the expression of HAT, HDAC and H3K23, H4K16ac. (a) mRNA levels of Hdac2 and Sirt1 deacetylases and Kat2a acetylase in PD3 offspring ovaries. (b) WB for SIRT1 and KAT2A in the same above ovaries. All analyses were repeated at least three times on different samples. (c) The localization of KAT2A in the PD3 mouse ovaries. (d) Representative WB brands and quantification of H3K23ac and H4K16ac with ZEA treatment in PD3 ovaries. (e) Representative WB bands and quantification of H3K23ac and H4K16ac level in newborn ovaries cultured for three days with Hdac2 RNAi in vitro. All analyses were repeated at least three times on different samples. Data are shown as mean ± SD (*P < 0.05; **P < 0.01). Supplementary Fig. 6 Inhibition of Hdac2 expression alleviated the inhibitory effect of ZEA on PF formation. (a) Representative images of MVH staining with ZEA treatment and/or Hdac2-RNAi on PD0 ovaries cultured in vitro for 3 days; scale bar = 50 μm and 10 μm. (b) Number of MVH positive oocytes (upper) and the percentage of oocytes in cysts or in PF (below) in the five experimental groups, the data were calculated as mean counting of eight sections per ovary. Each group at least forty sections from five ovaries as analyzed. All analyses were repeated at least three times on different samples. Data are shown as mean ± SD (*P < 0.05; **P < 0.01). Supplementary Fig. 7 The administration of CoQ10 alleviated the DNA damage caused by ZEA in oocytes. (a) Representative images of double staining with MVH and γ-H2AX in the four experimental groups ovaries at PD3. Scale bar = 50 μm. (b) Percentage of MVH and γ-H2AX double-positive oocytes in each group. (c) Representative WB brands and quantification of γ-H2AX protein in each group. All analyses were repeated at least three times on different samples. Data are shown as mean ± SD (*P < 0.05; **P < 0.01) (PDF 1832 kb)

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Feng, YQ., Wang, JJ., Li, MH. et al. Impaired primordial follicle assembly in offspring ovaries from zearalenone-exposed mothers involves reduced mitochondrial activity and altered epigenetics in oocytes. Cell. Mol. Life Sci. 79, 258 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00018-022-04288-0

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