UCL Discovery
UCL home » Library Services » Electronic resources » UCL Discovery

Associated degeneration of ventral tegmental area dopaminergic neurons in the rat nigrostriatal lactacystin model of parkinsonism and their neuroprotection by valproate

Harrison, IF; Anis, HK; Dexter, DT; (2016) Associated degeneration of ventral tegmental area dopaminergic neurons in the rat nigrostriatal lactacystin model of parkinsonism and their neuroprotection by valproate. Neuroscience Letters , 614 pp. 16-23. 10.1016/j.neulet.2015.12.052. Green open access

[thumbnail of 1-s2.0-S0304394015303438-main.pdf]
Preview
Text
1-s2.0-S0304394015303438-main.pdf - Published Version

Download (2MB) | Preview

Abstract

Parkinson's disease (PD) manifests clinically as bradykinesia, rigidity, and development of a resting tremor, primarily due to degeneration of dopaminergic nigrostriatal pathways in the brain. Intranigral administration of the irreversible ubiquitin proteasome system inhibitor, lactacystin, has been used extensively to model nigrostriatal degeneration in rats, and study the effects of candidate neuroprotective agents on the integrity of the dopaminergic nigrostriatal system. Recently however, adjacent extra-nigral brain regions such as the ventral tegmental area (VTA) have been noted to also become affected in this model, yet their integrity in studies of candidate neuroprotective agents in the model have largely been overlooked. Here we quantify the extent and distribution of dopaminergic degeneration in the VTA of rats intranigrally lesioned with lactacystin, and quantify the extent of VTA dopaminergic neuroprotection after systemic treatment with an epigenetic therapeutic agent, valproate, shown previously to protect dopaminergic SNpc neurons in this model. We found that unilateral intranigral administration of lactacystin resulted in a 53.81% and 31.72% interhemispheric loss of dopaminergic SNpc and VTA neurons, respectively. Daily systemic treatment of lactacystin lesioned rats with valproate however resulted in dose-dependant neuroprotection of VTA neurons. Our findings demonstrate that not only is the VTA also affected in the intranigral lactacystin rat model of PD, but that this extra-nigral brain region is substrate for neuroprotection by valproate, an agent shown previously to induce neuroprotection and neurorestoration of SNpc dopaminergic neurons in this model. Our results therefore suggest that valproate is a candidate for extra-nigral as well as intra-nigral neuroprotection.

Type: Article
Title: Associated degeneration of ventral tegmental area dopaminergic neurons in the rat nigrostriatal lactacystin model of parkinsonism and their neuroprotection by valproate
Location: Ireland
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1016/j.neulet.2015.12.052
Publisher version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neulet.2015.12.052
Language: English
Additional information: © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Keywords: Dopamine, Histone deacetylase inhibitor, Lactacystin, Parkinson’s disease, Substantia Nigra pars compacta, Valproate, Ventral tegmental area
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Medical Sciences > Div of Medicine
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Medical Sciences > Div of Medicine > Department of Imaging
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1476676
Downloads since deposit
122Downloads
Download activity - last month
Download activity - last 12 months
Downloads by country - last 12 months

Archive Staff Only

View Item View Item