| Spinal cord injury (SCI) is the most serious complication of spinal injury, which often results in significant neurological dysfunction and disability. SCI typically impacts younger individuals and reduces quality of life years. Currently, there is stilll no effective therapy for repairing the damaged spinal cord.Primary and secondary mechanisms of injury are two pathophysiological processes after traumatic SCI. Primary injury is irreversible, and secondary injury is caused by the primary injury. Pathophysiological mechanisms involved in the evolution of secondary injury including ischemia-reperfusion, inflammation, apoptosis, edema,cytokines, growth factors, oxidants and free radical and other anomalies, are generally considered as reversible. Currently, the treatment strategiy after traumatic SCI is to prevent the development of secondary injury.NRG-1 is produced by neurons and glial cells. NRG-1 not only promotes neuronal survival, migration and neurite outgrowth, but also promotes the glial cells proliferation, differentiation and migration. NRG-1 plays a critical role in promoting synapse maturation in both central nervous system (CNS) and peripheral nervous system (PNS). NRG-1 and its ErbB receptors upregulated in rats that underwent ischemic stroke, NRG-1 plays its neuroprotective role by anti-apoptosis and anti-inflammation by giving NRG-1 after middle cerebral artery occlusion in rats.Although neuroprotective effects of NRG-1 in ischemic brain damage have been shown in ischemic stroke model, its neuroprotective effect is unknown in SCI.In this study, we investigated the anti-apoptosis and anti-inflammatory role of NRG-1 following Spinal cord injury. We assessed proinflammatory cytokines TNF-a,IL-1?, IL-6 and anti-inflammatory cytokines IL-10, the cell apoptosis Caspase-3,anti-apoptosis Bcl-2, the survival rate of neuron and fiber length in the injury site for NRG-1. These results may provide new treatments for SCI. This study was undertaken to investigate neuroprotective effects of Neuregulin-1? (NRG-1) in spinal cord injury. Rats underwent complete spinal cord transection and were randomly divided into normal group,NS group and NRG-1 group. Therapy with NRG-1 after rat spinal cord injury, the proinflammatory cytokines tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-a,interleukin (IL)-1?, IL-6 and the cell apoptosis Caspase-3 were significantly reduced.Meanwhile the levels of the anti-inflammatory cytokines IL-10, anti-apoptosis Bcl-2,the survival rate of neurons and fiber length in the injury site were increased. Our results demonstrate that NRG-1 is a potential strategy for reducing secondary damage and promoting functional recovery by anti-inflammatory and anti-apoptotic following spinal cord injury. |
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