The role of alkaloids in Ipomoea carnea toxicosis: A study in rats

Ipomoea carnea promotes in livestock a toxicosis histologically characterized by vacuolated cells in different organs. The toxic principles of I. carnea are the alkaloids swainsonine and calystegines B1, B2, B3 and C1. However, it has not been determined whether the effects observed in rats treated with this plant are only due to swainsonine or if the calystegines have some additive toxic effect. Thus, the aim of the present study was to evaluate in rats the toxic effects of the I. carnea aqueous fraction (AF) and of its different alkaloids when administered individually at the same concentration as in this fraction, for 14 days. No anorexic effect and/or alteration in body weight was observed in any group. The histopathologic study showed that while calystegines did not produce any toxic effects, swainsonine and I. carnea AF promoted vacuolation in different organs, being more severe in the animals from the I. carnea AF group and extensible to other organs evaluated. No alterations were detected in the central nervous system of rats of any group assayed. The results obtained here suggest that calystegines may act as coadjuvants of swainsonine in I. carnea toxicosis; however, little can be proposed about the neurotoxic effect of I. carnea since rats did not prove to be a good model for the reproduction of neuronal storage disease.