| 1. |
- Li, Tao, et al.
(författare)
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Overexpression of apoptosis inducing factor aggravates hypoxic-ischemic brain injury in neonatal mice
- 2020
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Ingår i: Cell death & disease. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2041-4889. ; 11:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Apoptosis inducing factor (AIF) has been shown to be a major contributor to neuron loss in the immature brain after hypoxia-ischemia (HI). Indeed, mice bearing a hypomorphic mutation causing reduced AIF expression are protected against neonatal HI. To further investigate the possible molecular mechanisms of this neuroprotection, we generated an AIF knock-in mouse by introduction of a latent transgene coding for flagged AIF protein into the Rosa26 locus, followed by its conditional activation by a ubiquitously expressed Cre recombinase. Such AIF transgenic mice overexpress the pro-apoptotic splice variant of AIF (AIF1) at both the mRNA (5.9 times higher) and protein level (2.4 times higher), but not the brain-specific AIF splice-isoform (AIF2). Excessive AIF did not have any apparent effects on the phenotype or physiological functions of the mice. However, brain injury (both gray and white matter) after neonatal HI was exacerbated in mice overexpressing AIF, coupled to enhanced translocation of mitochondrial AIF to the nucleus as well as enhanced caspase-3 activation in some brain regions, as indicated by immunohistochemistry. Altogether, these findings corroborate earlier studies demonstrating that AIF plays a causal role in neonatal HI brain injury.
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| 2. |
- Xu, Yiran, 1988, et al.
(författare)
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Cranial irradiation alters neuroinflammation and neural proliferation in the pituitary gland and induces late-onset hormone deficiency.
- 2020
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Ingår i: Journal of cellular and molecular medicine. - : Wiley. - 1582-4934 .- 1582-1838. ; 24:24, s. 14571-14582
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Cranial radiotherapy induces endocrine disorders and reproductive abnormalities, particularly in long-term female cancer survivors, and this might in part be caused by injury to the pituitary gland, but the underlying mechanisms are unknown. The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of cranial irradiation on the pituitary gland and related endocrine function. Female Wistar rat pups on postnatal day 11 were subjected to a single dose of 6Gy whole-head irradiation, and hormone levels and organ structure in the reproductive system were examined at 20weeks after irradiation. We found that brain irradiation reduced cell proliferation and induced persistent inflammation in the pituitary gland. The whole transcriptome analysis of the pituitary gland revealed that apoptosis and inflammation-related pathways were up-regulated after irradiation. In addition, irradiation led to significantly decreased levels of the pituitary hormones, growth hormone, adrenocorticotropic hormone, thyroid-stimulating hormone and the reproductive hormones testosterone and progesterone. To conclude, brain radiation induces reduction of pituitary and reproduction-related hormone secretion, this may due to reduced cell proliferation and increased pituitary inflammation after irradiation. Our results thus provide additional insight into the molecular mechanisms underlying complications after head irradiation and contribute to the discovery of preventive and therapeutic strategies related to brain injury following irradiation.
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| 3. |
- Qiu, Lin, 2000, et al.
(författare)
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Acute and Long-Term Effects of Brief Sevoflurane Anesthesia During the Early Postnatal Period in Rats
- 2016
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Ingår i: Toxicological Sciences. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 1096-6080 .- 1096-0929. ; 149:1, s. 121-133
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The possibility that exposure to general anesthetics during early life results in long-term impairment of neural function attracted considerable interest over the past decade. Extensive laboratory data suggest that administration of these drugs during critical stages of central nervous system development can lead to cell death, impaired neurogenesis, and synaptic growth as well as cognitive deficits. These observations are corroborated by several recent human epidemiological studies arguing that such cognitive impairment might also occur in humans. Despite the potential public health importance of this issue, several important questions remain open. Amongst them, how the duration of anesthesia exposure impact on outcome is as yet not fully elucidated. To gain insight into this question, here we focused on the short- and long-term impact of a 30-min-long exposure to clinically relevant concentrations of sevoflurane in rat pups at 2 functionally distinct stages of the brain growth spurt. We show that this treatment paradigm induced developmental stage-dependent and brain region-specific acute but not lasting changes in dendritic spine densities. Electrophysiological recordings in hippocampal brain slices from adult animals exposed to anesthesia in the early postnatal period revealed larger paired-pulse facilitation but no changes in the long-term potentiation paradigm when compared with nonanesthetized controls. 5-bromo-2-deoxyuridine pulse and pulse-chase experiments demonstrated that neither proliferation nor differentiation and survival of hippocampal progenitors were affected by sevoflurane exposure. In addition, behavioral testing of short- and long-term memory showed no differences between control and sevoflurane-exposed animals. Overall, these results suggest that brief sevoflurane exposure during critical periods of early postnatal development, although it does not seem to exert major long-term effects on brain circuitry development, can induce subtle changes in synaptic plasticity and spine density of which the physiological significance remains to be determined.
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| 4. |
- Rodriguez, Juan, 1983, et al.
(författare)
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Lack of the brain-specific isoform of apoptosis-inducing factor aggravates cerebral damage in a model of neonatal hypoxia-ischemia.
- 2018
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Ingår i: Cell Death & Disease. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2041-4889. ; 10:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Apoptosis-inducing factor (AIF) may contribute to neuronal cell death, and its influence is particularly prominent in the immature brain after hypoxia-ischemia (HI). A brain-specific AIF splice-isoform (AIF2) has recently been discovered, but has not yet been characterized at the genetic level. The aim of this study was to determine the functional and regulatory profile of AIF2 under physiological conditions and after HI in mice. We generated AIF2 knockout (KO) mice by removing the AIF2-specific exon and found that the relative expression of Aif1 mRNA increased in Aif2 KO mice and that this increase became even more pronounced as Aif2 KO mice aged compared to their wild-type (WT) littermates. Mitochondrial morphology and function, reproductive function, and behavior showed no differences between WT and Aif2 KO mice. However, lack of AIF2 enhanced brain injury in neonatal mice after HI compared to WT controls, and this effect was linked to increased oxidative stress but not to caspase-dependent or -independent apoptosis pathways. These results indicate that AIF2 deficiency exacerbates free radical production and HI-induced neonatal brain injury.
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| 5. |
- Sun, Yanyan, et al.
(författare)
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Dichloroacetate treatment improves mitochondrial metabolism and reduces brain injury in neonatal mice
- 2016
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Ingår i: Oncotarget. - : Impact Journals, LLC. - 1949-2553. ; 7:22, s. 31708-31722
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of dichloroacetate (DCA) treatment for brain injury in neonatal mice after hypoxia ischemia (HI) and the possible molecular mechanisms behind this effect. Postnatal day 9 male mouse pups were subjected to unilateral HI, DCA was injected intraperitoneally immediately after HI, and an additional two doses were administered at 24 h intervals. The pups were sacrificed 72 h after HI. Brain injury, as indicated by infarction volume, was reduced by 54.2% from 10.8 +/- 1.9 mm(3) in the vehicle-only control group to 5.0 +/- 1.0 mm(3) in the DCA-treated group at 72 h after HI (p = 0.008). DCA treatment also significantly reduced subcortical white matter injury as indicated by myelin basic protein staining (p = 0.018). Apoptotic cell death in the cortex, as indicated by counting the cells that were positive for apoptosis-inducing factor (p = 0.018) and active caspase-3 (p = 0.021), was significantly reduced after DCA treatment. The pyruvate dehydrogenase activity and the amount of acetyl-CoA in mitochondria was significantly higher after DCA treatment and HI (p = 0.039, p = 0.024). In conclusion, DCA treatment reduced neonatal mouse brain injury after HI, and this appears to be related to the elevated activation of pyruvate dehydrogenase and subsequent increase in mitochondrial metabolism as well as reduced apoptotic cell death.
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| 6. |
- Wang, Yafeng, 1985, et al.
(författare)
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Inhibition of autophagy prevents irradiation-induced neural stem and progenitor cell death in the juvenile mouse brain
- 2017
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Ingår i: Cell Death & Disease. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2041-4889. ; 8:3
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Radiotherapy is an effective tool in the treatment of malignant brain tumors. However, damage to brain stem and progenitor cells constitutes a major problem and is associated with long-term side effects. Autophagy has been shown to be involved in cell death, and the purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of autophagy inhibition on neural stem and progenitor cell death in the juvenile brain. Ten-day-old selective Atg7 knockout (KO) mice and wild-type (WT) littermates were subjected to a single 6Gy dose of whole-brain irradiation. Cell death and proliferation as well as microglia activation and inflammation were evaluated in the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus and in the cerebellum at 6 h after irradiation. We found that cell death was reduced in Atg7 KO compared with WT mice at 6 h after irradiation. The number of activated microglia increased significantly in both the dentate gyrus and the cerebellum of WT mice after irradiation, but the increase was lower in the Atg7 KO mice. The levels of proinflammatory cytokines and chemokines decreased, especially in the cerebellum, in the Atg7 KO group. These results suggest that autophagymight be a potential target for preventing radiotherapy-induced neural stem and progenitor cell death and its associated long-term side effects.
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| 7. |
- Xiong, Wenjuan, et al.
(författare)
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SiNx films and membranes for photonic and MEMS applications
- 2020
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Ingår i: Journal of materials science. Materials in electronics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0957-4522 .- 1573-482X. ; 31, s. 90-97
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This work presents a novel process to form SiN x films and process for membranes with excellent mechanical properties for micro-electro-mechanical systems application as well as integration as IR waveguide for photonic application. The SiN x films were fabricated in SiNgen apparatus which is a single wafer chamber equipment compared to conventional low pressure chemical vapor deposition furnace process. The films showed low stress, good mechanical properties, but the synthesis also eradicates the issues of particle contamination. Through optimizing of the growth parameters and post annealing profile, low stress (40 Mpa) SiN x film could be finally deposited when annealing temperature rose up to 1150 °C. The stress relaxation is a result of more Si nano-crystalline which was formed during annealing, according to the FTIR results. The mechanical properties, Young’s modulus and hardness, were 210 Gpa and 20 Gpa respectively. For the waveguide application, a stack of three layers, SiO 2 /SiN x /SiO 2 was formed where the optimized layer thicknesses were used for minimum optical loss according to simulation feedback. After deposition of the first two layers in the stack, the samples were annealed in range of 900–1150 °C in order to release the stress. Chemical mechanical polish technique was applied to planarize the nitride layer prior to the oxide cladding layer. Such wafers can be used to bond to Si or Ge to manufacture advanced substrates.
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| 8. |
- Xu, Yiran, 1988, et al.
(författare)
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Cranial Irradiation Induces Hypothalamic Injury and Late-Onset Metabolic Disturbances in Juvenile Female Rats.
- 2018
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Ingår i: Developmental Neuroscience. - : S. Karger AG. - 0378-5866 .- 1421-9859. ; 40:2, s. 120-33
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Cranial radiotherapy is one of the most effective tools for treating children with brain tumors. However, radiotherapy-induced late-onset side effects have a significant impact on patients' quality of life. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of irradiation on metabolism and the possible molecular and cellular mechanisms behind such effects. Female Wistar rats were subjected to a single dose of 6-Gy whole-brain irradiation on postnatal day 11. The animals were sacrificed 6 h or 20 weeks after irradiation. Cell death and proliferation, microglial activation, and inflammation were analyzed and RNA sequencing was performed. We found that irradiation led to a significantly increased body weight from 15 weeks (p < 0.05) along with white adipose tissue accumulation and adipocyte hypertrophy at 20 weeks, and these changes were accompanied by glucose and lipid metabolic disturbances as indicated by reduced glucose tolerance, increased insulin resistance, increased serum triglycerides, and an increased leptin/adiponectin ratio. Furthermore, irradiation induced cell death, microglial activation, inflammation, and persistent astrocyte reactivity in the hypothalamus. Hypothalamic transcriptome analysis showed that 865 genes were downregulated and 290 genes were upregulated in the irradiated group 20 weeks after irradiation, and further pathway analysis showed that the insulin resistance-related PI3K-Akt signaling pathway and the energy expenditure-related adipocytokine signaling pathway were downregulated. Gene Ontology enrichment analysis showed that the expression of fatty acid metabolism-related proteins and effector proteins was significantly different in the irradiation group. This study demonstrates that ionizing radiation to the juvenile female brain induces hypothalamic damage that is likely to be associated with delayed metabolic abnormalities, and this critical vulnerability of the hypothalamus to irradiation should be taken into consideration in the development of future protective strategies for radiotherapy.
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| 9. |
- Zhou, Kai, et al.
(författare)
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Lithium protects hippocampal progenitors, cognitive performance and hypothalamus-pituitary function after irradiation to the juvenile rat brain
- 2017
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Ingår i: Oncotarget. - : Impact Journals, LLC. - 1949-2553. ; 8:21, s. 34111-34127
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Cranial radiotherapy in children typically causes delayed and progressive cognitive dysfunction and there is no effective preventive strategy for radiation-induced cognitive impairments. Here we show that lithium treatment reduced irradiation-induced progenitor cell death in the subgranular zone of the hippocampus, and subsequently ameliorated irradiation-reduced neurogenesis and astrogenesis in the juvenile rat brain. Irradiation-induced memory impairment, motor hyperactivity and anxiety-like behaviour were normalized by lithium treatment. Late-onset irradiation-induced hypopituitarism was prevented by lithium treatment. Additionally, lithium appeared relatively toxic to multiple cultured tumour cell lines, and did not improve viability of radiated DAOY cells in vitro. In summary, our findings demonstrate that lithium can be safely administered to prevent both short- and long-term injury to the juvenile brain caused by ionizing radiation.
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