Toxicological Effects of TCE and NAC

Five-week old female MRL+/+ mice (23–26 g) were purchased from The Jackson Laboratory (Bar Harbor, ME) and housed at the UTMB animal house facility maintained at ∼22°C, 50–60% relative humidity, and a 12 hr light/dark cycle. The animals were provided standard lab chow and drinking water ad libitum and were acclimated for 1 week prior to the treatment. The experiments were performed in accordance with the guidelines of the National Institutes of Health and were approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of University of Texas Medical Branch. The mice, divided into 4 groups of 6 each, were treated with TCE, NAC or TCE plus NAC (TCE, 10 mmol/kg, i.p., every 4^th day; NAC, 250 mg/kg/day through drinking water) [3] (link), [21] (link), [25] (link),[32] (link),. The control mice received an equal volume of corn oil only. After 6 weeks of treatment, the animals were euthanized under nembutal (sodium pentobarbital) anesthesia, and blood was withdrawn from the inferior vena cava. Individual sera, obtained following blood clotting and centrifugation, were stored in small aliquots at −80°C until further analysis. At the same time, major organs were immediately removed and weighed. Portions of livers and kidneys from control and TCE-treated mice were snap-frozen in liquid nitrogen and stored at −80°C for the further analysis.