Antioxidant effect of genistein on ovarian tissue morphology, oxidant and antioxidant activity in rats with induced polycystic ovary syndrome.

Rajaei S, Alihemmati Ph D A, Abedelahi Ph D A
International journal of reproductive biomedicine · 2019 · doi:10.18502/ijrm.v17i1.3816 · PMID:31435584 · PMC6652161
OA: gold CC-BY-NC-4.0
📄 Open PDF Full text JSON View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by qwen3.7-flash, 2026-10-06 ⓘ

Genistein treatment improved ovarian tissue morphology and restored antioxidant enzyme activity while reducing oxidative stress markers in rats with experimentally induced polycystic ovary syndrome.

One-sentence paraphrase of the abstract; not a substitute for reading it. No clinical advice. How this works

⚙ AI-generated deep summary by qwen3.7-flash, 2026-09-04 · read from full text ⓘ

This study investigated the antioxidant effects of genistein on ovarian tissue morphology and oxidant-antioxidant activity in rats with induced polycystic ovary syndrome. Researchers administered genistein to PCOS-induced rats and measured body weight, ovarian histology, and markers such as malondialdehyde, superoxide dismutase, and glutathione peroxidase. The results showed that genistein treatment significantly reduced oxidative stress, improved follicular quality, and lowered body and ovarian weights compared to untreated PCOS rats. Relevance to endometriosis: listed as one indication for GnRH antagonists, though the paper's main focus is uterine fibroids.

Read from the paper's body, not the abstract. Not a substitute for reading the paper. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

BackgroundOxidative stress is the most frequent cause of female infertility disorders including polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). Genistein as a major component of soybean isoflavone scavenges free radicals by antioxidant activities.ObjectiveThe present study examines the antioxidant effects of genistein on ovarian tissue following experimental PCOS in rats.Materials and methodsTwenty female Wistar rat were randomly divided into the following groups (n=5 each group): (I) control group (no treatment); (II) induced PCOS (injection of estradiol valerate); (III) genistein-treated non-PCOS (received genistein); and (IV) genistein-treated PCOS groups. The weight of rats were measured and the blood samples collected and centrifuged. The oxidant and antioxidant activity of plasma and ovaries were measured. All rats were sacrificed under anesthesia, and ovaries were collected and weighted. Histological examination and follicular quality were assessed by staining.ResultsIn histological observation, the induced PCOS rats displayed more number of atretic follicles and the follicular quality in genistein-treated rats was similar to the control groups. The plasma and ovaries malondialdehyde levels significantly increased in PCOS rats (p < 0.001), while the total antioxidant capacity levels, glutathione peroxidase, and superoxide dismutase activities significantly decreased (p < 0.001). The plasma and ovary malondialdehyde levels significantly decreased in PCOS rats that were treated with genistein (p < 0.001) and the total antioxidant capacity (p < 0.05), glutathione peroxidase, and superoxide dismutase activities significantly increased (p < 0.001).ConclusionTreatment with genistein preserved follicular quality by increasing antioxidant activities and scavenging oxidant levels in PCOS rats.
Full text 21,481 characters · extracted from pmc-nxml · 2 sections · click to expand

Section

Our study revealed that there is an increased oxidative stress and decreased antioxidant activity in rat PCOS model, and suggests that oxidative stress as an important pathological feature of PCOS could induce formation of cystic follicles and disrupt follicular structure. Thus, these physical, biochemical and histological results clearly demonstrated that treatment with genistein promotes follicular growth by achieving an adequate antioxidant defense system and scavenging free radicals, thereby reducing the harmful effects of excess of oxidative stress on follicular structure in the PCOS model. Further researches are recommended to clarify the effects of genistein on oxidative stress in the PCOS model.

Coi Statement

The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.

Text is read by the "Ask this paper" AI Q&A widget below. Extraction quality varies by source — PMC NXML preserves structure cleanly, OA-HTML may include some navigation residue, and OA-PDF can have broken hyphenation. The publisher copy (via DOI) is the canonical version.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

⚙ Ask this paper AI returns verbatim quotes from the full text · source: pmc-nxml ⓘ

Answers must be backed by verbatim quotes from this paper's full text. Hallucinated quotes are dropped automatically; if no verbatim passage answers the question, we say so. How this works

Citation neighborhood (no data yet)

We don't have any in-corpus citations linked to this paper yet. The paper's references may be in our DB but unresolved to ``paper_id`` (resolution happens at ingest when the cited DOI matches a row we already have). Run the cross-source citation reconcile pass to retry.

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-10-04T09:26:46.659050+00:00
unpaywall
last seen: 2026-05-21T05:10:58.409756+00:00
License: CC-BY-NC-4.0