Effects of prenatal pulsed electromagnetic fields on neural stem cell proliferation and nestin protein expression in the hippocampus of rat offspring / 中国组织工程研究

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND:Electromagnetic fields can cause changes of the body,especially the nervous system.Effect of pulsed electromagnetic fields(PEMFs)on neural stem cells has been detected.OBJECTIVE:To investigate the effect of prenatal pulsed electromagnetic fields(PPEMFs)on neural stem cell proliferation and nestin protein expression in the hippocampus of rat offspdng.METHODS:Sprague Dawley female rats weighing 240-260 g were included and randomly divided into two groupscontrol and PPEMFs.Rats from the control group were given no interventions.Rats from the PPEMFs group were given PEMFs stress at gestational days 14-20.Each stress was given three times daily for 10 minutes.The male and female offspring rats were sacrificed at 1 month of age and their brains were sectioned to determine the expression of nestin protein and Brdu-positive cells in the hippocampus by immunohistochemistry.RESULTS:The expression of nestin-and Brdu-positive cells in the hippocampus of female and male PEMFS offspring were significantly higher compared with the control group(P<0.001),and there was a significant difference between female and male offspring(P<0.001).The nestin-and Brdu-positive cells in female offspring outnumbered those in male offspring(P<0.001);however,there was no significant difference between female and male offspring in the control group(P>0.05).CONCLUSION:PPEMFs can increase the number and proliferative capability of the neural stem cells in offspring.It may be a pdmary stage of the cascade reaction of the body to the brain damage caused by PPEMFs stress.