Recovery from trauma induced amnesia correlates with normalization of thrombin activity in the mouse hippocampus

PLoS One. 2017 Nov 28;12(11):e0188524. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0188524. eCollection 2017.

Abstract

Transient amnesia is a common consequence of minimal traumatic brain injury (mTBI). However, while recent findings have addressed the mechanisms involved in its onset, the processes contributing to its recovery have not yet been addressed. Recently, we have found that thrombin is detected at high concentrations in the brain of mice after exposure to mTBI and that in such settings amnesia is rescued by either inhibiting thrombin activity or by blockade of PAR1. Here, we report that mice spontaneously recover from amnesia after two weeks from mTBI exposure. At this time point, long term potentiation was equally evoked in injured vs. control animals with thrombin concentration in the brain being normalized at this stage. These findings, which refer to the specific aspect of memory retrieval upon mTBI, together with our previous work, hint to a strong correlation between cognitive defects in the context of mTBI and thrombin concentrations in the brain. This may suggest that a possible scavenging of thrombin in the brain at early phases following mTBI may improve memory function.

MeSH terms

  • Amnesia / etiology*
  • Animals
  • Brain Injuries, Traumatic / physiopathology
  • Hippocampus / metabolism*
  • Hippocampus / physiopathology
  • Mice
  • Thrombin / physiology*
  • Wounds and Injuries / complications*

Substances

  • Thrombin

Grants and funding

This work was supported by a grant from the Institute of Military Medicine at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (#4440691738) to NM and CGP and a Kamin research program grant (#56338) from the Israeli Ministry of Economy and Industry to NM. NM is the recipient of a Talpiot Medical Leadership Program Fellowship from the Chaim Sheba Medical Center. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.