Chronic (3-Weeks) Treatment of Estrogen (17β-Estradiol) Enhances Working and Reference Memory in Ovariectomized Rats: Role of Acetylcholine.

Recently there has been a growing interest in the effects of estrogen on cognitive functions. In this study, we aimed to examine 17β-estradiol treatment on working and reference memory in ovariectomized rats. We also examined the changes in the acetylcholine (ACh) levels in the brain areas associated with learning and memory.

Erythropoietin pretreatment suppresses seizures and prevents the increase in inflammatory mediators during pentylenetetrazole-induced generalized seizures.

Erythropoietin (EPO) suppresses epileptic seizures, but the mechanism is unclear. The search for novel targets in the therapy of epilepsy has focused recently on brain inflammation since brain inflammation and the associated blood-brain barrier (BBB) damage appears to be an integral part of epilepsy pathophysiology. We examined the effects of EPO on proinflammatory mediators in brain and serum in PTZ-induced generalized seizure model.

The relationship between erythropoietin pretreatment with blood-brain barrier and lipid peroxidation after ischemia/reperfusion in rats.

Blood-brain barrier (BBB) leakage plays a role in the pathogenesis of many pathological states of the brain including ischemia and some neurodegenerative disorders. In recent years, erythropoietin (EPO) has been shown to exert neuroprotection in many pathological conditions including ischemia in the brain. This study aimed to investigate the effects of EPO on BBB integrity, infarct size and lipid peroxidation following global brain ischemia/reperfusion in rats.

Erythropoietin prevents the increase in blood-brain barrier permeability during pentylentetrazol induced seizures.

Recombinant human erythropoietin (r-Hu EPO) has been shown to exert neuroprotection in ischemic, excitotoxicity, trauma, convulsions and neurodegenerative disorders. Blood-brain barrier (BBB) leakage plays a role in the pathogenesis of many pathological states of the brain including neurodegenerative disorders. This study aimed to investigate the effects of r-Hu EPO on BBB integrity in pentylentetrazol (PTZ) induced seizures in rats.

Nitric oxide involvement in seizures elicited by pentylentetrazol and sex dependence.

It has been known that susceptibility to some types of epilepsy is affected by sex. In addition, the role of NO in epileptogenesis is still unclear; NO has been suggested to be either an anticonvulsive or a proconvulsive agent. In an attempt to elucidate both the role of NO and sex differences in sensitivity to seizures, male and female Wistar rats were treated intraperitoneally (i.

Nicotine improves learning and memory in rats: morphological evidence for acetylcholine involvement.

It has been suggested that nicotine improves rapid information processing (learning and memory) tasks. However, it is not clear which aspects of cognition actually underlie these improvements because relatively less attention has been given to nicotinic cholinergic systems compared to muscarinic systems. The authors therefore studied the effects of nicotine on the learning and memory performance by a step-through passive avoidance task.

Tolerance to pentylentetrazol-induced convulsions and protection of cerebrovascular integrity by chronic nicotine.

The authors' previous studies have shown that in nicotine-induced seizures sensitivity was decreased and blood-brain barrier (BBB) disruption was prevented as a consequence of nicotine pretreatment. This study aimed to investigate the possible protective actions of nicotine on cerebrovascular permeability and seizures induced by pentylentetrazol (PTZ) injection. Cerebrovascular effects of nicotine were evaluated by measuring the permeability changes of BBB using Evans-Blue (EB) dye and specific gravity (SG), which indicates brain water and protein content.