Effect of 6 Weeks Endurance Exercise on Hippocampal Pannexin-1 and NLRP-1 Protein Levels in Experimental Diabetic Male Wistar Rats

Diabetes is one of the most common metabolic diseases that is associated with high blood sugar and can cause disorders of the central nervous system. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of a course of endurance activity on the levels of hippocampal Pannexin-1 and NLRP-1 proteins in diabetic Wistar rats.

In this experimental study, 28 rats with 10 weeks of age and average weight of 245±9.4 g were randomly divided into 4 groups of 7: control diabetic, trained diabetic, healthy control and healthy trained. Intraperitoneal injection of streptozotocin (45 mg/kg) was used to induce diabetes. Then, the endurance training protocol was performed for 6 weeks. 24 h after the last training session, hippocampal tissue of rats was extracted and Pannexin-1 and NLRP-1 protein levels were measured by Western Blot Method. In this study, one-way analysis of variance and Tukey test as a follow-up test were used. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS software version 18.

The results showed that the expression of Pannexin-1 and NLRP-1 protein was significantly increased in diabetic rats (P<0.05). Moreover, the results of Pannexin-1 and NLRP-1 protein expression showed that the expression of both proteins decreased significantly after 6 weeks of endurance training in the training diabetic group compared to the control diabetic group (P <0.05).

Our findings confirmed the effects of hyperglycemia induced by endurance physical activity and consequently its effect on the decreased expression of Pannexin-1 and NLRP-1 proteins. Therefore, it seems that physical activity may play an important role in ameliorating neurodegenerative disorders in type 1 diabetic patients by reducing the expression of these proteins.