Morroniside improves the neurological function in intracerebral hemorrhage rats by inhibiting inflammatory response / 中国组织工程研究

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Morroniside has been shown to play roles of anti-inflammation, antioxidant, anti-apoptosis, promoting vascular and neural regeneration, anti-platelet aggregation and neuroprotection in the rat model of ischemic brain injury, but whether it can inhibit the inflammatory reaction of cerebral hemorrhage is unclear. OBJECTIVE: To observe the changes of inflammatory factors (interleukin-1, tumor necrosis factor-α) and inflammatory-related proteins (nuclear factor-κB and SUMO2/3) as well as neurologic function in a rat model of cerebral hemorrhage treated with morroniside at different doses. METHODS: Healthy male Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly divided into sham operation, cerebral hemorrhage and low-, medium- and high-dose morroniside groups. The model of cerebral hemorrhage was established in the latter four groups by injecting autologous blood from the tail artery, followed by intragastric injection of 30, 90, 270 mg/kg morroniside in the three morronicide groups, respectively, three times daily for consecutive 7 days; the rats in the sham operation and model groups were given same volume of normal saline. Then, the neurological function was evaluated by Neurological Severity Scores; the brain tissue around the hematoma were removed to observe the morphological changes of neurocytes around the hematoma by hematoxylin-eosin staining; the expression levels of interleukin-1 and tumor necrosis factor α in the brain tissue were detected by ELISA; the expression levels of nuclear factor-κB and SUMO2/3 were detected by immunohistochemistry and western blot assay. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Compared with the icerebral hemorrhage group, the low-, medium- and high-dose morroniside groups showed a significnat neurological improvement, especially the high-dose group (P < 0.05). Compared with the sham operation group, the cerebral hemorrhage and morroniside groups exhibited a significant increase in the nerve function damage and expression levels of interleukin-1, tumor necrosis factor α, nuclear factor-κB and SUMO2/3 (P < 0.05). Compared with the cerebral hemorrhage group, in the low-, medium- and high-dose morroniside groups, the expression levels of interleukin-1 and tumor necrosis factor α were significantly reduced, and expression levels of nuclear factor-κB and SUMO2/3 were significantly increased (P < 0.05). In summary, high-dose morroniside can improve the neurological function in rats with cerebral hemorrhage by down-regulating the levels of inflammatory cytokines.