Our goal in this study was to determine the effect of dietary supplementation with Moringa oleifera (M. oleifera), and Azadirachta indica (A. indica) leaves in mitigating the effects of chronic oxyfluorfen (OXY) toxicity on the health status, expressions of immune and antioxidant genes, and tissue morphological alterations in Oreochromis niloticus. In this study, we used 370 healthy O. niloticus (average weight = 25.35 ± 0.29 g). We used 70 fish to study the 96 h lethal concentration 50 (LC50) of OXY. We assigned another 300 fish into six equal groups with five replicates (50 fish/group, 10 fish/replicate) to determine the chronic OXY toxicity for 60 days. The 96 h LC50 of OXY for O. niloticus was 6.685 mg/L. Exposure to 1/10 96 h LC50 of OXY (0.668 mg/L) had health impacts and pathological changes in the main tissues. In addition, the expressions of oxidant and immune genes were disrupted. Dietary supplementation with both M. oleifera and A. indica efficiently mitigated the toxic effects of OXY in the treated groups. Comparing the palliative efficiency of M. oleifera and A. indica, the results showed that M. oleifera was more potent in alleviating the toxic effects of OXY.
Hyperthyroidism is associated with cardiac hypertrophy, fibrosis, and increased risk of cardiovascular mortality. Sacubitril/valsartan (LCZ696) is a new combined drug that has shown promise for the treatment of hyperthyroidism-associated heart failure; however, the underlying molecular mechanisms, including the contributions of epigenetic regulation, remain unclear. The present study was designed to investigate the therapeutic efficacy of LCZ696 and the potential contributions of microRNA regulation in a rat model of hyperthyroidism-induced cardiac hypertrophy. Cardiac hypertrophy was induced by intraperitoneal administration of levothyroxine. Sixty adult male Wistar rats were randomly allocated to four equal groups (15 rats each): control, cardiac hypertrophy (CH), CH + valsartan, and CH + LCZ696. Treatment with LCZ696 or valsartan significantly improved hemodynamic abnormalities, normalized serum concentrations of natriuretic peptide, fibroblast growth factor-23, and cardiac inflammatory markers compared to CH group rats. Treatment with LCZ696 or valsartan also normalized myocardial expression levels of autophagy markers, fibrotic markers, PPAR-ϒ, mir-377, and let-7b. In addition, both valsartan and LCZ696 ameliorated collagen deposition, ventricular degeneration, and various ultrastructural abnormalities induced by levothyroxine. The beneficial effects of LCZ696 were superior to those of valsartan alone. The superior efficacy of LCZ696 may be explained by the stronger modulation of miR-377 and let-7b.