effects of n-acetylcysteine on fas gene expression level in testicular tissue of acrylamide-treated adult rats

Background & objectives: acrylamide (acr) is a chemical with toxic effects on various body tissues. the present study was conducted to investigate the antioxidant effect of n-acetylcysteine (nac) on the level of testicular apoptosis in acrylamide-treated adult rats. material & methods: thirty-six adult male wistar rats were randomly divided into 6 equal groups. the intact control group was without treatment, the positive control group (pc) received 50 mg/kg acr by oral gavage, the negative control group (nc) received 40 mg/kg nac intraperitoneally, the animals in experimental groups of 1 (exp1), 2 (exp2) and 3 (exp3) received 10, 20 and 40 mg/kg nac intraperitoneally, respectively, and then all groups received 50 mg/kg acrylamide by oral gavage. the treatment period in all groups was 28 days. at the end of the study, fas mrna expression level was measured by real-time pcr and testicular tissue was evaluated histopathologically. results: the pc group showed a significant increase in fas gene expression level (p<0.05) and spermatogenic degradation compared to the intact control and nc groups. the exp1 and exp2 groups showed decrease in fas gene expression level (p-0.05) and spermatogenesis improvement in a dose-dependent manner while the exp3 group exhibited a significant decrease in fas gene expression level (p-0.05) and complete spermatogenesis recovery compared to the pc group. conclusion: the findings indicate that acr increases apoptosis and destroys spermatogenesis by increasing fas gene expression levels. in contrast, at the maximum dose (40 mg/kg), nac could inhibit acr-induced apoptosis by reducing fas gene expression and improves spermatogenesis in rats.