Papers by Keyword: Hippocampus

Abstract: To observe the effect of curcumin on the morphology of the hippocampus in young and aged rats with vascular dementia (VD) induced by chronic cerebral hypoperfusion, then further investigate whether the effect of curcumin have any differences in age. Both young and aged Male Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly divided into normal control group, sham-operated group, 2VO group, 2VO+curcumin 50mg/Kg group and 2VO+curcumin 100mg/Kg goup. Permanent occlusion of bilateral common carotid arteries ligation (2VO) method was used to establish chronic cerebral ischemia model. The rats were injected intraperitoneally with curcumin or DMSO once daily for 30d. The pathological changes of CA1 region of the hippocampus were measured by HE staining and Nissl staining. Chronic cerebral ischemia led to pathological changes of young and aged rats, but no significant differences were found between the two ages of rats (t=0.658，P=0.523). Furthermore, curcumin could reduce the pathological injury of CA1 region of the hippocampus in young and aged VD rats, no significant differences were found between the two ages of rats (P=0.384，P=0.380). Curcumin can reduce the brain damage in young and aged VD rats in dose-dependent manner but without age difference. Our study suggests that the pathological injury of the hippocampus might be one of the mechanisms of curcumin’s protection effect of VD rats.

Abstract: Disorder of cholesterol metabolism plays important roles in pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Plant compound curcumin has been reported to decrease Aβ deposition and cholesterol in serum, while the detailed mechanism is still unknown. To investigate the effect of curcumin on the cholesterol metabolism in Alzheimer’s disease, APPswe/PS1dE9 double transgenic mice were fed with 500ppm of curcumin every day for six months. Immunohistochemistry results showed that the expression of ATP-binding cassette transporter A1 (ABCA1) in hippocampal neurons was increased significantly, whereas the expression of scavenger receptor class B type I (SR-BI) was not detected. These findings suggest that curcumin may promote cholesterol efflux via ABCA1 transmembrane-transport system rather than SR-BI in neurons of AD.

Abstract: The segmentation and labeling of sub-cortical structures of interest are important tasks for the assessment of morphometric features in quantitative magnetic resonance (MR) image analysis. Recently, multi-atlas segmentation methods with statistical fusion strategy have demonstrated high accuracy in hippocampus segmentation. While, most of the segmentations rarely consider spatially variant model and reserve all segmentations. In this study, we propose a novel local patch-based and ranking strategy for voxelwise atlas selection to extend the original Simultaneous Truth and Performance Level Estimation (STAPLE) algorithm. The local ranking strategy is based on the metric of normalized cross correlation (NCC). Unlike its predecessors, this method estimates the fusion of each voxel patch-by-patch and makes use of gray image features as a prior. Validation results on 33 pairs of hippocampus MR images show good performance on the segmentation of hippocampus.

Abstract: AIMS: To explore gene expressions of Bax and changes of cytC releasing in the CIR hippocampus neuron; to observe the effect on CIR with ligustrazine. METHODS: According to Bannisters, we made ischemia and reperfusion models of rat, and then using ligustrazine to cure; we observed the expression changes of Bax gene in hippocampus neurons by nucleic acid in situ hybridization, detecting cytC release through Western blotting. RESULTS: Ligustrazine protect neuron by reducing neuronal apoptosis induced by CIR, and inhibiting release of cytc by releasing.

Abstract: The anodization of aluminum templates created nanoporous alumina tubes arranged parallel to each other and electrodeposition using gold solution (AuHCl₄) resulted in arrays of gold nanowires (GNWs) inside the pores. For investigation of Au-nano-neuronal interactions, we have cultured embryonic day 18 rat hippocampal neurons on the surface of nanowires. For preliminary understanding of the neuronal growth and connectivity, we studied the images of nano-neuronal interactions by using optical, fluorescence and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). For adhesion of neurons to nanoarrays surfaces, we used bioconjugating protein coating Poly-D-Lysine (PDL). The embryonic hippocampal tissues were dissociated mechanically and cultured on Au-nano templates. We demonstrated well-defined neuronal networks on Au-nanowire (GNW) arrays and on standard glass coverslips. The neurons attached with the nanowires surfaces by an interface of PDL, which is a positively charged poly-peptide and plays a vital role in neurites growth on the nanowire arrays. The pre- and post-synaptic affects of neuronal interactions on the surfaces of nanowires were measured by Ca+ imaging in Keck microscope.

Abstract: To select differentially expressed proteins in hippocampus of rats with pattern of Liver Qi stagnation and Spleen deficiency (LQSSD) induced by chronic immobilization stress (CIS), by applying the technique of protein chip and surface-enhanced laser desorption ionization time of flight mass spectrometry (SELDI-TOF-MS). Methods: The rats with pattern of LQSSD according to traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) were replicated by the method of CIS. After twenty-one days’ stress, the protein chip weak cation CM10 and SELDI-TOF-MS were applied in order to do mass spectral analysis of the proteins acquired from the three groups: normal control group, 21 days model group, and Xiaoyaosan (XYS) treatment group. Bio Marker Wizard software were adopted to analyze the differentially expressed proteins. Results: Five differentially expressed proteins were selected between the control group and model group, and they were all highly expressed in the model group. Thirteen one were selected between control group and treatment group, among which 3 were highly expressed in the treatment group, and 10 were highly expressed in the control group. Only 1 differentially expressed protein was selected between the treatment group and the model group and it was highly expressed in the latter. Conclusion: The differentially expressed proteins may be the specific marker proteins in hippocampus of rats with pattern of LQSSD induced by CIS. TCM formula XYS may be an effective intervention for protein expression in hippocampus of rats with pattern of LQSSD.