Curcumin Alleviates Cerebral Ischemia-reperfusion Injury by Inhibiting NLRP1-dependent Neuronal Pyroptosis

• Published in: Current neurovascular research Vol. 18; no. 2; p. 189
• Main Authors: Huang, Lifa, Li, Xu, Liu, Yajun, Liang, Xiaolong, Ye, Hui, Yang, Chao, Hua, Lin, Zhang, Xin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United Arab Emirates 01.01.2021
• Subjects: Animals; Brain Ischemia - metabolism; Cell Proliferation - drug effects; Cerebral Cortex - drug effects; Cerebral Cortex - metabolism; Curcumin - pharmacology; Curcumin - therapeutic use; Male; Nerve Tissue Proteins - metabolism; Neurons - drug effects; Neurons - metabolism; Pyroptosis - drug effects; Rats; Rats, Sprague-Dawley; Reperfusion Injury - drug therapy; Reperfusion Injury - metabolism; pyroptosis; Cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury; NLRP1; brain; blood reperfusion; curcumin
• ISSN: 1875-5739
• DOI: 10.2174/1567202618666210607150140

Cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury is caused by a blood reperfusion injury in the ischemic brain and usually occurs in the treatment stage of ischemic disease, which can aggravate brain tissue injury. Curcumin was reported to exert a good therapeutic effect on neural cells against ischemia- reperfusion injury, However, the mechanism is not clear. In this study, Oxygen-Glucose Deprivation (OGD) model of fetal rat cerebral cortical neurons and the Middle Cerebral Artery Occlusion (MCAO) model of rats were employed to mimic cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury in vitro and in vivo, respectively. We confirmed that curcumin has a promotive effect on neuronal proliferation and an inhibitory effect on neuronal pyroptosis. Furthermore, we found that curcumin could improve cerebral infarction. The results of western blotting showed that curcumin down-regulated the expression of nucleotide-binding oligomerization domain-containing protein-, leucine-rich repeats-, and pyrin domain-containing protein 1 (NLRP1), cysteinyl aspartate-specific protease 1 (caspase-1), gasdermin D (GSDMD), IL-1β, IL-6, TNF-α, and iNOS proteins in OGD and MCAO models. NLRP1- dependent neuronal pyroptosis played an important role in cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury. Curcumin could effectively inhibit NLRP1-dependent neuronal pyroptosis by suppressing the p38 MAPK pathway and therefore exerted neuroprotective effects against cerebral ischemia- reperfusion injury.