Toxicogenomic difference between diethylstilbestrol and 17β-estradiol in mouse testicular gene expression by neonatal exposure

In this study, we investigated the effects of neonatal exposure to exogenous estrogen (diethylstilbestrol: DES, 17beta-estradiol: E-2) on testicular gene expressions. Male C57BL/6J mice, 1 day after birth, were subcutaneously injected with DES or E-2 (3 mug/mouse/day) for 5 days, and then they were raised for 8 weeks. In morphological observation of 8-week-old mice testes, spermatozoa were absent from many seminiferous tubules in DES-treated mice testes, but there was no change in E-2-treated mice testes. Analysis of in-house cDNA microarray (mouse cDNA 889 genes) revealed that 17 genes were altered in DES-treated mice testes at 8 weeks of age, compared to each control. Real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (real-time RT-PCR) analysis of these genes revealed that some genes, which were changed in E-2-treated testis, were the same as in DES-treated testis, whereas in other cases there was a difference between DES-treated and E-2-treated testis. The present results suggest that each exogenous estrogenic compound has both a common gene expression change pattern and its own testicular gene expression change pattern.