Effect of water restrictions on the physiological parameters,psychological behavior and brain c-Fos expression in rat

1 Introduction Exposure to hostile stressors causes a series of coor- dinated responses in the body, such as alterations of neu- roendocrine secretion, immune reaction and behavioral manifestation to maintain homeostasis stability and sur-vival of the organisms. Stressors are divided into two main categories: physical, or systemic, and psychological, or emotional / processive. Each stressor might activate a spe- cific central pathway to induce a special neuroendocrine response, even cause stre…     

Design and application research of nucleotide sequence analysis system software

INTRODUCTION　　From integrallevel and celllevel,the research of organism and diseasediagnosishave already entered molecular level.Molecular biology is the science to researchstructure and function of organism macromolecule.Based on differentgene code se-…     

Puerarin blocks Na~+ current in rat ventricular myocytes

AIM: To study the effect of puerarin (Pue) on Na~+ channel in rat ventricular myocytes. METHODS: Whole-cell patch-clamp technique was applied on isolated cardiomyocytes from rats. RESULTS: Pue inhibited cardiac I_(Na) in a positive rate-dependent and dose-dependent manner, with an IC_(50) of 349 μmol/L. The kinetics of blockage of cardiac sodium channel by Pue resembled the ClassIa/Ic of antiarrhythmic agents. Pue 300 μmol/L did not alter the shape of the I-V curve of I_(Na), but markedly shifted the steady-state inactivation curve of I_(Na) towards more negative potential by 15.9 mV, and postponed the recovery of I_(Na) inactivation state from (21.9±1.6) ms to (54.4±3.4) ms (P<0.01 ). It demonstrated that the steady state of inactivation was affected by Pue significantly. CONCLUSION: Pue protected ventricular myocytes against cardiac damage and arrhythmias by inhibiting recovery from inactivation of cardiac Na~+ channels.     

Facilitating effect of histamine on spatial memory deficits induced by dizocilpine as evaluated by 8-arm radial maze in SD rats

AIM: To investigate whether or not histamine is involved in spatial memory deficits induced by dizocilpine (MK-801) as evaluated by 8-arm radial maze of rats. METHODS: 8-Arm (4-arm baited) radial maze was used to measure spatial memory in rats. RESULTS: Bilaterally intrahippocampal (ih) injection of MK-801 (0.3 μg/site) impaired working memory and reference memory in rats. Both histamine (50, 100 ng/site, ih) and intraperitoneal (ip) injection of histidine (100, 200 mg/kg) markedly improved the spatial memory deficits induced by MK-801. On the other hand, the ameliorating effect of histidine (100 mg/kg, ip) was completely antagonized by α-fluoromethylhistidine (α-FMH, 5 μg/site, ih), a potent and selective histidine decarboxylase (HDC) inhibitor, and H_1-antagonist pyrilamine (1 μg/site, ih), but not by H_2-antagonist cimetidine, even at a high dose (2.5 μg/site, ih). CONCLUSION: The hippocampal histamine plays an important role in the ameliorating effect on MK-801-induced spatial memory deficits,     

Anti-inflammatory effect of methoxyphenamine compound in rat model of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

AIM: To evaluate the anti-inflammatory effect of methoxyphenamine compound (MC) on chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in rats by measurement of proinflammatory cytokines, total and differential white cell counts (WCC) of bronchroalveolar lavage fluid (BALF). METHODS: Adult rat model of COPD (COPD group) was induced by intratracheal instillation of lipopolysaccharides and exposure to cigarette smoke. Treatment groups received different dosage of MC (3, 9, and 27 mg daily, MC group) or prednisone (0.25 mg daily, P group) respectively. Tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), interleukin 1beta (IL-113), interleukin-6 (IL-6), transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) of BALF were determined by ELISA. Total and differential WCC were performed after Giemsa staining. RESULTS: The levels of TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, TGF-β, total and differential WCC in BALF of MC groups were significantly decreased than that of COPD group (P<0.01), and there was no significant difference among MC groups. There was no significa