Does exposure to the organophosphate chlorpyrifos induce Parkinson’s disease and depression-like behavior similar to rotenone and paraquat?

Abstract

The cause of Parkinson disease is unknown, but epidemiological studies suggest that there is an association between pesticides and this neurodegenerative disease. Investigations have proven that rotenone and paraquat are emerging Parkinson disease model systems, since they cause nigrostriatal dopaminergic degeneration. Moreover, depression is a prevalent non-motor feature of Parkinson disease. In this paper, we studied to see whether chlorpyrifos is able to elicit Parkinson disease and depression-like behaviors similar to that seen in paraquat and rotenone exposure. Our findings indicate that chlorpyrifos does induce depression-like behavior similar to paraquat and rotenone, but it failed to elicit two hallmarks of PD which are loss of dopamine neurons in the substantia nigra and increased levels of α-synuclein.