ABSTRACT
Objective To investigate the effects of Bushen Huoxue acupuncture method on the behavioral changes and the proliferation of endogenous neural stem cells (NSCs) in hippocampus of Alzheimer disease (AD) model mice. Methods 18 male SAMP8 mice, seven months old, were randomly divided into acupuncture group, non-acupoint control group, and model control group. And another age-matched 6 male SAMR1 mice were prepared as normal control group. Mice in acupuncture group were intervened by acupuncture method in the acupoints of "Shenshu", "Baihui", "Xuehai", and "Geshu". Mice in non-acupoint control group were treated by stimulating the fixed non-point under the bilateral rib, while mice in model control group and normal control group were raised without special treatment but administered the stimulation of catching with the same time and the same stimulus intensity. All treatrment lasted for 8 weeks. After the intervention, the learning and memory abilitities and brain hippocampus Brd U positive cells of all groups were detected. Results Compared with the nomal control group, mice in the model control group had longer escape latency and less time spent in former platform quadrant (P＜0.05); the number of Brd U positive cells decreased significantly (P＜0.05). Compared with the model control group and the non-acupoint control group, mice in the acupuncture group had shorter escape latency and more time spent in former platform quadrant (P＜0.05); the number of Brd U positive cells increased significantly (P＜0.05). Conclusion Bushen Huoxue acupuncture method can improve the learning and memory abilities of SAMP8 mice AD model by inducing the proliferation of hippocampal endogenous NSCs.