Grouping Pentylenetetrazol-Induced Epileptic Rats According to Memory Impairment and MicroRNA Expression Profiles in the Hippocampus

PLoS One. 2015 May 11;10(5):e0126123. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0126123. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

Previous studies have demonstrated a close relationship between abnormal regulation of microRNA (miRNA) and various types of diseases, including epilepsy and other neurological disorders of memory. However, the role of miRNA in the memory impairment observed in epilepsy remains unknown. In this study, a model of temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) was induced via pentylenetetrazol (PTZ) kindling in Sprague-Dawley rats. First, the TLE rats were subjected to Morris water maze to identify those with memory impairment (TLE-MI) compared with TLE control rats (TLE-C), which presented normal memory. Both groups were analyzed to detect dysregulated miRNAs in the hippocampus; four up-regulated miRNAs (miR-34c, miR-374, miR-181a, and miR-let-7c-1) and seven down-regulated miRNAs (miR-1188, miR-770-5p, miR-127-5p, miR-375, miR-331, miR-873-5p, and miR-328a) were found. Some of the dysregulated miRNAs (miR-34c, miR-1188a, miR-328a, and miR-331) were confirmed using qRT-PCR, and their blood expression patterns were identical to those of their counterparts in the rat hippocampus. The targets of these dysregulated miRNAs and other potentially enriched biological signaling pathways were analyzed using bioinformatics. Following these results, the MAPK, apoptosis and hippocampal signaling pathways might be involved in the molecular mechanisms underlying the memory disorders of TLE.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Cluster Analysis
  • Computational Biology
  • Databases, Nucleic Acid
  • Disease Models, Animal
  • Epilepsy / chemically induced
  • Epilepsy / genetics*
  • Epilepsy / physiopathology*
  • Gene Expression Profiling
  • Hippocampus / metabolism*
  • Hippocampus / physiopathology*
  • Leukocytes, Mononuclear / metabolism
  • Male
  • Maze Learning
  • Memory*
  • MicroRNAs / genetics*
  • Pentylenetetrazole / adverse effects
  • Rats
  • Transcriptome*

Substances

  • MicroRNAs
  • Pentylenetetrazole

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC); Grant number: 81360201.