Levodopa reduces the growth promoting effects of striatal extracts on rostral mesencephalic tegmentum cultures.

Rats with unilateral 6-hydroxydopamine lesions (6-OHDA) of the mesencephalon and vehicle controls (SHAM) were chronically treated with carbidopa (CD) or CD plus levodopa (CD/LD) for 18 days. Seventy-two hours following the last treatment, ipsilateral striata, contralateral striata, and cerebellums from each treatment group were homogenized separately and the supernatant extracts were incubated with rostral mesencephalic tegmentum cultures. As indices of growth-promoting activity (GPA), number of viable neurons and their process lengths were measured 40 h later. In all cultures exposed to striatal extracts, the 6-OHDA lesion was associated with greater GPA than the SHAM extracts. CD/LD consumption reduced this GPA in a dose-dependent fashion in both the lesioned and the SHAM animals. These data suggest that denervation of the striatum enhances the production of a striatally derived neurotrophic factor, the production of which is sensitive to levodopa. Chronic levodopa treatment in Parkinson's disease may therefore contribute to disease progression by reducing the compensating effects of this neurotrophic factor on remaining mesencephalic neurons.