stereological study on the effect of vitamin c in preventing the adverse effects of bisphenol a on rat ovary

background: bisphenol a (bpa), an environmental pollutant, can generate free radicals which damages the reproductive system. vitamin c is an antioxidant which may prevent the adverse effects of free radicals.objective: the aim was to investigate the effect of vitamin c on the ovary tissue in rats treated with bpa.materials and methods: in this experimental study, 24 female wistar rats (200±20 gr) were randomly divided into 4 groups (n=6): control, bpa (60 μg/kg/day), vitamin c (150 mg/kg/day) and bpa + vitamin c and orally treated for 20 days. the left ovaries were taken out, fixed for tissue processing and studied using stereological methods. data were analyzed with spss using one-way anova, and the means were considered significantly different at (p<0.05).results: the total volume of ovary and cortex (p<0.01), medulla (p<0.05), the volume of corpus luteum (p<0.001) and the mean number of antral follicles (p<0.001) significantly reduced in bpa group compared with control, while the number of atretic follicles increased (p<0.05). the volume of oocyte (p<0.01) and its nucleus (p<0.001) in the antral follicles and the thickness of zona pellucida (zp) in the secondary (p<0.05) and antral (p<0.001) follicles significantly decreased in bpa group compared with controls. the above parameters in the bpa + vitamin c group were compensated to control level.conclusion: vitamin c can be used as a potential antioxidant in the case of bpa toxication.