Lee Gihyun, Kim Woojin
Department of Physiology, College of Korean Medicine, Kyung Hee University, Seoul 02447, Republic of Korea.
Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2017;2017:9785345. doi: 10.1155/2017/9785345. Epub 2017 Oct 18.
The Locus Coeruleus (LC) is a small collection of noradrenergic neurons located in the pons. In the brain, noradrenaline (NE) is primarily produced by noradrenergic cell groups in the LC, which is the largest group of noradrenergic neurons in the central nervous system. Acupuncture, including the electroacupuncture which is a modified acupuncture method, is known to be effective in various kinds of diseases, and the involvement of noradrenergic system in the central nervous system has been reported by previous studies. However, on whether acupuncture can modulate the LC neuronal cells activities, results vary from studies to studies. In this paper, we included twelve articles, which observed the effect of acupuncture on the activities of LC in humans and animals. Our study shows that, among twelve included studies, six reported decrease of LC activities, whereas six showed increase of LC activities after acupuncture treatment. Although it is difficult to draw a firm conclusion, the authors suggest that the difference of frequencies may play an important role in the modulatory effect of acupuncture on LC. Further studies are needed to clarify the precise mechanism of acupuncture on LC, as it can lead to a new therapeutic method for various LC-NE related diseases.
蓝斑（LC）是位于脑桥的一小群去甲肾上腺素能神经元。在大脑中，去甲肾上腺素（NE）主要由蓝斑中的去甲肾上腺素能细胞群产生，蓝斑是中枢神经系统中最大的去甲肾上腺素能神经元群。针灸，包括作为改良针灸方法的电针，已知对各种疾病有效，并且先前的研究已经报道了去甲肾上腺素能系统在中枢神经系统中的参与。然而，关于针灸是否能调节蓝斑神经元细胞的活动，研究结果各不相同。在本文中，我们纳入了12篇文章，这些文章观察了针灸对人和动物蓝斑活动的影响。我们的研究表明，在纳入的12项研究中，6项报告针灸治疗后蓝斑活动降低，而6项显示蓝斑活动增加。尽管很难得出确凿的结论，但作者认为频率差异可能在针灸对蓝斑的调节作用中起重要作用。需要进一步的研究来阐明针灸对蓝斑的确切机制，因为这可能会导致针对各种与蓝斑 - 去甲肾上腺素相关疾病的新治疗方法。
