수영 운동이 외상성 뇌손상 유발 흰쥐에서의 c-Fos 발현에 미치는 영향

Abstract

Traumatic brain injury is known to cause severe neurological damage and has a high mortality rate. c-Fos expression is recognized as a marker of increased neuronal activity, however, excessive c-Fos expression represents apoptotic neuronal cell death. In the present study, the effect of swimming exercise on traumatic brain injury-induced c-Fos expression in rats was investigated by c-Fos immunohistochemistry. The rats were divided into 3 groups: the sham-operation group, the traumatic brain injury-induction group, and the traumatic brain injury-induction and swimming exercise group. The animals in the exercise group were forced to swim for 30 min once a day during 14 consecutive days. The present results showed that traumatic brain injury enhanced the number of c-Fos-positive cells in the paraventricular nucleus (PVN) and ventrolateral periaqueductal gray (vlPAG) regions and that swimming exercise significantly suppressed the traumatic brain injury-induced c-Fos expression. In the traumatic brain injury rats, swimming exercise exerted inhibitory effect on the c-Fos exepression in the PVN and vlPAG regions. Based on the present results, it can be suggested that swimming exercise has a neuroprotective against traumatic brain injury by suppressing c-Fos expression.