Influences of age and duration of status convulsivus on cytochrome C release in hippocampus

    YUAN Aiª²Yun, JIANG Li, LI Xin

    Department of Neurology, Children¬ðs Hospital, Chongqing University of Medical Sciences, Chongqing 400014, China

    ¡¾Abstract¡¿ AIM: To explore the influences of age and duration of status convulsivus(SC)on intracellular cytochrome C (cytC) release in hippocampus. METHODS: Convulsive seizures for 30 min or 3 h (30 min SC or 3 h SC) were induced in 80 infant (20 d after birth) and 80 adult Wistar rats (IRs £¦ ARs respectively) with lithiumª²pilocarpine ip. The rats were sacrificed at 6 different time points from the 3 h to 7 d after SC termination. Dynamic change of cytC level in hippocampal cells was investigated by flow cytometry. RESULTS: ¢Ù The level of cytC in hippocampal cells increased in the early stage after 30 min SC, and started to decrease 12 h after SC in both IRs and ARs. The peak level was reached 6 h after SC [(32.47¡À6.28) in IRs and (33.23¡À8.66) in ARs)]. Both of them were significantly higher than those of control group (P<0.01). ¢Ú At the 7th day after 30 min SC, the level of hippocampal intracellular cytC in IRs had decreased to the level of normal controls, while the level in ARs was still higher than that of normal controls (P<0.05). At the 1st, the 3rd, and the 7th day after SC, the levels of hippocampal intracellular cytC in IRs were obviously lower than those in ARs. ¢Û Compared with the same time point after 30 min SC, the levels of hippocampal intracellular cytC after 3 h SC were much higher in different age groups (P<0.05). Except the effect of the ageª²related difference, there was a positive correlation between the duration of SC and hippocampal intracellular cytC content in partial correlation analysis(r=0.66 ......