Authors :
Presenting Author: Jing Zhu, BS – Brain Korea 21 Project, Yonsei University College of Medicine
Soojin Park, BS – Yonsei University College of Medicine; Chul Hoon Kim, MD, PhD – Yonsei University College of Medicine; Kyoung Hoon Jeong, PhD – Yonsei University College of Medicine; Won-Joo Kim, MD, PhD – Gangnam Severance Hospital, Yonsei University Health System
Rationale:
Intensive activation of glia cells including astrocyte and microglia is a pathological hallmark of epilepsy that leads to inflammatory process. Thus, reduction of glial-derived inflammation may be an important strategy to prevent the pathogenesis of epilepsy. Recent reports showed that eugenol provided anti-oxidative and anticonvulsant effect in epilepsy model; however, whether eugenol exerts anti-inflammatory effect remains unknown. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of eugenol on neuroprotection and anti-inflammation in the mouse model of pilocarpine-induced status epilepticus (SE).
Methods:
Adult male C57BL/6 mice were treated with pilocarpine 30 min after scopolamine injection, and then eugenol was treated for three days after seizure termination. To evaluate effect of eugenol, cresyl violet staining, TUNEL staining, immunofluorescence staining, and western blot were used in the present study.
Results:
Our results showed that eugenol effectively reduced SE-induced apoptotic neuronal cell death and activation of astrocytes and microglia in the hippocampus. These protective effects of eugenol were associated with decreased the level of proinflammatory cytokines. Furthermore, eugenol treatment dampened NF-ĸB activation and NLRP3 inflammasome expression in the hippocampus after SE.
Conclusions:
Taken together, the present study suggests that eugenol may provide therapeutic potential for suppressing neuroinflammatory processes induced by epileptic seizures.
Funding:
This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education (NRF-2021R1I1A1A01045520) and the Korea government (MSIT) (NRF-2022R1F1A1067170).