Impact of Pre-Conditioning Training on Brain Damage in the Hippocampus Following Ischemic/ Reperfusion Stroke in Rats

Cerebral ischemia/reperfusion causes structural and functional damage in the hippocampus. exercise pre-conditioning can be an effective way to prevent or reduce the risk of stroke. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of 8 weeks of Pre-conditioning exercise on treadmill on diminution of the neurons of CA1 region of hippocampus and expression of TNF-α protein following cerebral ischemia/ reperfusion in male rats.

Twenty and four male Wistar rats were randomly divided into four groups of sham, training, ischemia and ischemia+ training. The rats in training group were trained to run on a treadmill 5 days a week, for 8 weeks before induction of ischemia. Ischemia was induced by blocking both common carotid arteries for 45 minutes. Hematoxylin and eosinophil (H&E) staining and immunohistochemical method were used to neuronal death, and protein expression respectively.

The number of apoptosis neurons in the CA1 area were significantly increased in the ischemia group, compared with the sham and training group (p<0.05). Also, in the ischemia+ training group number of cell death and Expression of TNF-α were significantly lower than ischemia group. (p<0.05).

Regarding on the results, it seems that exercise pre-conditioning on treadmill, as a neuroprotective stimulant, would have protective effects against cell death and inflammation.