Cytotoxicity of sub-lethal doses of vanadium pentoxide in male Oryctolagus cuniculus

Abstract

Vanadium pentoxide (V₂O₅) is one of the compounds that have been reported to pose varying degrees of toxicity upon exposure; thus, making it a challenging environmental hazard that affects living organisms. This study investigated the cytotoxicity effects of daily sub-lethal oral doses of V₂O₅ on the bone marrow of male Oryctolagus cuniculus after 21 days. Male O. cuniculus (n = 60, ∼ 6 week old, 433.45 ± 5.00 g body weight) were simply randomized into four experimental groups and a control with three replicates of four animals each. Based on the estimated 96-h LD₅₀ value of 119.0 mg/kg, sub-lethal doses of V₂O₅ were prepared as 1 mg/kg, 5 mg/kg, 10 mg/kg and 20 mg/kg, and administered to the test animals daily by oral gavage for 21 days. Vanadium pentoxide induced cytotoxicity in the bone marrow cells (BMCs) of exposed groups, with significant changes in all evaluated haemopoietic bone marrow stem cells (erythrocytes, leukocytes, thrombocytes and plasma cells). There were mixed trends in the values of leucocyte differentials in the exposed animal. Oral exposure to V₂O₅ exerts cytopathologic effects in the forms of DNA damage on the bone marrow of O. cuniculus. These findings support previous reports on the environmental hazards vanadium pentoxide poses to living organisms.