1. Functional protection of learning and memory abilities in rats with vascular dementia
- Author
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Huaying Tao, Huiyun Yang, Ouyan Shi, Xin Tian, Haixuan Qiao, Yanjiao Jin, Chunquan Cai, and Petra Henrich-Noack
- Subjects
Male ,Time Factors ,medicine.medical_treatment ,Biophysics ,Morris water navigation task ,Hippocampal formation ,Rats, Sprague-Dawley ,Developmental Neuroscience ,Western blot ,Downregulation and upregulation ,Occlusion ,medicine ,Animals ,cardiovascular diseases ,Maze Learning ,Vascular dementia ,CA1 Region, Hippocampal ,PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway ,Neurons ,Analysis of Variance ,Memory Disorders ,medicine.diagnostic_test ,Learning Disabilities ,Dementia, Vascular ,TOR Serine-Threonine Kinases ,musculoskeletal, neural, and ocular physiology ,medicine.disease ,Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation ,Rats ,Transcranial magnetic stimulation ,Disease Models, Animal ,Eukaryotic Initiation Factor-4E ,Gene Expression Regulation ,nervous system ,Neurology ,Neurology (clinical) ,Psychology ,Neuroscience - Abstract
Purpose The present study clarified the effects of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) in rats with vascular dementia (VaD) and explored the underlying mechanisms. Methods Two-vessel occlusion was used as a VaD model. Two weeks after carotid artery occlusion, high (5 Hz) or low (1 Hz) frequency rTMS were applied for 10 days. Spatial learning and memory abilities were tested with a Morris water maze. Hippocampal CA1 neurons were histologically examined. The expressions of mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) and eukaryotic initiation factor 4E (eIF-4E) in CA1 were detected by western blot, and immunohistochemistry. Results Unlike unlesioned control animals, VaD rats had an impaired morphology of CA1 neurons and a reduced ability of spatial memory. rTMS significantly improved both, the morphology and the learning and memory abilities of VaD rats compared to untreated lesioned rats. Protein expressions of mTOR and eIF-4E in CA1 of VaD rats were lower than in control rats but rTMS significantly increased the expression compared to untreated VaD rats. Conclusions rTMS promotes recovery of learning and memory abilities of VaD rats. Molecular analysis suggests that the beneficial effect of rTMS may be partly induced by upregulation of protein expressions of mTOR and eIF-4E in CA1.
- Published
- 2014