The effects of physical exercises on recurrent seizures-induced long-term cognitive deficit and zinc transporter-3 expression in the hippocampus of developmental period rats / 中华物理医学与康复杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To explore the effects of physical exercises on recurrent seizures-induced long-term learning and memory deficits and on the expression of zinc transporter-3(ZnT-3)in hippocampuses of developmental period rats.Methods Sprague-Dawley rats aged 21 d were randomly divided into blank control group,exercises control group,seizure group and seizure plus exercises group.Abdominal cavity injections of penicillin or saline were used to induce recurrent seizure or as a control in the corresponding groups.During the postnatal(P)39-44 d and P61-65 d periods,Morris water-maze tests were administered to evaluate spatial learning and memory capacity.During the P48-53 d period,the rats in exercises control and seizure plus exercises groups were subjected to a 30-min daily aerobic exercises program for 6 d.The real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction(RT-PCR)method was used to detect the expression of ZuT-3 mRNA in hippocampuses of all rats at P66 d. Results Searching strategyThere was a decreasing incidence of marginal strategy and an increasing trend in the use of taxis and straight line strategy in all four groups.The scores on d 1 and 4 were significantly higher in two control groups than in two seizure groups in water-maze test(all P＜0.05).By d 2 the exercises control and seizure plus exercises groups were scoring significantly higher than the bland control and seizure groups(P＜0.05).Memory testThe frequency of passing through the platform quadrant decreased significantly in the two seizure groups compared to the two control groups in both probe tests(all P＜0.05).RT-PCR testZnT-3 mRNA expressions in hippocampuses were significantly higher in seizure plus exercises group than in any other groups. Conclusions Penicillin-induced recurrent seizures can induce long-term damage on learning and memory capacity in developmerital period rats.Physical exercises can improve learning capacity.It's mechanism may be related to the up-regulation of ZnT-3 expression in hippocampus of rats.