Evaluation of the Toxic Effect Of Long Term Exposure to Commercial Grade Calcium Carbide And Ethylene Glycol in Wistar Rats

Abstract

Fruits play an important role in human nutrition, since they are good source of dietary antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals. Fruit traders collect the fruits in off-seasons, shipped in their immature stage and later they are artificially ripened using chemicals, to increase the cosmetic value. Despite the potential health hazards, an increase in calcium carbide (CaC2) and ethylene glycol (EG) for fruit ripening has been reported, especially in developing countries, including India. Fruits that are exceedingly raw require higher quantities of these compounds, which might render the fruit tasteless and harmful even more. Artificially ripened fruits are regarded safe for human consumption around the world, if only safe pure ripening agents are employed. But the contaminants from these chemical are known cytotoxic agents for human beings and the use of such agents should be avoided. Although earlier reports suggested that CaC2 and EG may have different biological effects, a comprehensive literature on the chronic toxicological impact of these two chemicals and their comparative analysis on haematological, histopathological, biochemical, and genomic studies was lacking or insufficient to prove their carcinogenic potential. newlineAim: To study the Cytotoxic and Genotoxic effects of acute, subacute, and chronic doses of Calcium carbide and Ethylene glycol in Wistar rats. newlineObjectives: and#61557; To evaluate the effect of CaC2 and EG exposure on haematological, biochemical, histopathological, and nuclear parameters. Materials and Procedures: The toxic effects of Commercial grade Calcium Carbide used for the experiment which is the low grade chemical commonly used by fruit vendors for artificial fruit ripening. The effect of CaC2 and EG were investigated through a series of toxicology studies as the first step, using acute (5 and 2g/kg b. wt. of CaC2 and EG), subacute (100,50mg/kg b. wt. of CaC2; 1000 and 500 mg/kg b. wt. of EG), Chronic (50mg/kg b. wt. of CaC2 and 500mg/kg b. wt. of EG) doses in Wistar albino rats.