Activation of extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 has been demonstrated in acute cerebral ischemia. Yaning Zhao and her colleagues, Hebei United University, China induced transient whole-brain ischemia by four-vessel occlusion in normal and diabetic rats and intravenously injected diabetic rats with extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 30 minutes before ischemia as a pretreatment. Results showed that during the pathological progression of cerebral ischemia/reperfusion in rats, activation of extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 exhibits protective effect on neuronal injury. Reduced extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 decreases Ku70 activity, increases Bax expression and thereby increases the number of lost hippocampal neurons in diabetic rats after cerebral ischemia/reperfusion. These results were published in Neural Regeneration Research (Vol. 9, No. 7, 2014).
Hematoxylin-eosin staining reveals that inhibition of extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 activity aggravates neuronal loss in the hippocampal CA1 region in a diabetic rat after cerebral ischemia/reperfusion.
(Photo Credit: Neural Regeneration Research)
Source: Neural Regeneration Research