Potential Anti-Apoptotic Impacts and Telomerase Activity of Royal Jelly on Different Tissues of Rats

Royal jelly (RJ) has a broad range of pharmaceutical activities, including antioxidant, anti-aging, anti-tumor, and anti-apoptotic. The current study aimed to investigate RJ impacts on cell survival by measuring the amount of telomerase enzyme, protein BCL2, and BAX in different tissues of rats.

In this study, male Wistar rats (n=21) were randomly divided into 3 groups; Group 1 was the control group. Group 2 and group 3 were treated with royal jelly at a concentration of 150 mg/kg and 300 mg/kg for 30 days, respectively. The contents of Bax, BCL-2, and telomerase in the tissues Brain, Liver, Kidney, and lymphocytes were measured using the ELISA method.

Telomerase increased in all the tissues involved in both treatment groups compared to the control group; however, the changes were not statistically significant. Although BAX and BCL-2 proteins showed irregular patterns, the ratio of BAX/BCL-2 declined in almost all the studied tissues with a significant decline in the rats’ liver and kidney treated with RJ at the dose of 300 mg/kg and in the lymphocytes of the group administered 150 mg/kg of RJ.

RJ appears to have potential anti-apoptotic effects on the rats’ tissues studied via regulating the levels of BAX, BCL-2, and telomerase proteins. Regarding telomerase, its levels increased in a dose-dependent manner in all involved tissues. Concerning the ratio of BAX/BCL-2, it is sensible to conclude that RJ tends to positively impact the cell survival rate at the dose of 300 mg/kg in the brain, Liver, and Kidney. Nonetheless, this ratio decreased more significantly at the dose of 150 mg/kg in lymphocytes, showing more potential to survive brain cells in this concentration.