Automated Dose-Response Analysis and Comparative Toxicogenomic Evaluation of the Hepatic Effects Elicited by TCDD, TCDF, and PCB126 in C57BL/6 Mice

The toxic equivalency factor (TEF) approach recommended by the World Health Organization is used to quantify dioxin-like exposure concentrations for mixtures of polychlorinated dibenzo-dioxins,-furans, and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), including 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzofuran (TCDF) and 3,3#,4,4#,5-pentachlorobiphenyl (PCB126) relative to 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD). Whole-genome microarrays were used to evaluate the hepatic gene expression potency of TCDF and PCB126 relative to TCDD with complementary histopathol-ogy, tissue level analysis, and ethoxyresorufin-O-deethylase (EROD) assay results. Immature ovariectomized C57BL/6 mice were gavaged with 0.001, 0.01, 0.03, 0.1, 0.3, 1, 3, 10, 30, 100, and 300 mg/kg TCDD and TEF-adjusted doses (TEF for TCDF and PCB126 is 0.1) of TCDF or PCB126 (1, 3, 10, 30, 100, 300, 1000, and 3000 mg/kg of TCDF or PCB126) or sesame oi