Hippocampal and cortical neuronal damage in the streptozotocin rat model of Alzheimer’s diseases

Introduction: Morphological changes in the brain of the streptozotocin-intracerebroventricularly (STZ-icv) treated rat model of sporadic Alzheimer’s disease (sAD) have been investigated in much lesser extent than the behavioral and neurochemical ones. We have investigated the STZ-icv dose-dependency of rat cortical and hippocampal neuronal damage in the acute and chronic phase following the icv-treatment. Methods: Adult male Wistar rats were administered STZ (0.1, 1 and 3 mg/kg dose) or vehicle (controls) icv injections and sacrificed 1 week and 3 months afterwards. Paraffin-embedded brain sections of pre-mortally fixative perfused animals were analysed by Nissl staining in the parietal cortex (PC), hippocampal regions C1, C2 and dentate gyrus (DG). Positive signal was image analyzed and quantified by “CellSense Dimension”. Statistical significance was tested by Kruskal-Wallis followed by Mann Whitney U test, p