Effect of caffeine and retinoic acid on skeleton of mice embryos

The present study was conducted to evaluate the effect of caffeine and retinoic acid either separately or in combination on the skeleton of the developing embryos of mice. Pregnant females were treated with either caffeine or retinoic acid at the onset of organogenesis (7th day of gestation). At morphological level no abnormalities in either caffeine or retinoic acid in the developing embryos at 14th day of gestation whose mothers’ were administered caffeine (2 mg/100 g b.w.) or those of the mothers’ treated with retinoic acid up to 4 mg/kg b.w. during the onset of the second trimester of pregnancy were observed. However, dose-dependent retinoic acid treatment initiates chondrocyte vacuolation, depression of PAS+ve intracellular inclusions and depression of nuclear fluorescence that were concomitant with downregulation of TGFβ2 expression in the perichondrium of the developing vertebrae. Co-administration of caffeine was found to ameliorate the effects of 2 mg/kg b.w. rather than 4 mg/kg b.w. of retinoic acid treatment. At the 18th day of gestation the uterine horns appeared normal without any signs of fetoresorption in all treatments. However, the effect of both caffeine (2 mg/100 g b.w) and retinoic acid at both doses (2, 4 mg/kg b.w) in Alizarin Red stain of wholemount revealed minor phalange deformation of the developing limbs either separately or in combined treatments.