Adenovirus-mediated gene transfer of Bcl-xL prevents cell death in primary neuronal culture of the rat

Bcl-xL is a Bcl-2-related gene that regulates programmed cell death in a bcl-2-independent fashion. It is expressed in tissues containing long-surviving postmitotic cells, such as neurons in adult brains. To investigate the possibility of gene therapy for transferring this anti-apoptotic gene into the neuron for the treatment of vascular occlusive or neurodegenerative diseases, we examined the effect of a replication-deficient recombinant adenovirus vector coding human Bcl-xL gene on the augmentation of the survival of primarily-cultured rat neuronal cells in vitro. Immunoblot analysis revealed that primarily-cultured neuronal cells were successfully infected and transferred with this gene by recombinant adenovirus vector with high transduction efficiency. Bcl-xL gene transfer to the primarily-cultured neurons could prevent these cells from cell death.