Department of Physiology, Medical Faculty, Kocaeli University, 41380, Kocaeli, Turkey; Molecular Neurobiology, Department of Experimental Medical Science, BMC B11, Lund University, 22184, Lund, Sweden.
Department of Medical Biology, Medical Faculty, Kocaeli University, 41380, Kocaeli, Turkey.
Neurosci Lett. 2019 Sep 14;709:134299. doi: 10.1016/j.neulet.2019.134299. Epub 2019 May 30.
Absence epilepsy (AE) is classified as a genetic generalized epilepsies. WAG/Rij strain of rats are regarded one of the most validated models of absence epilepsy. Studies point out the existence of hyperexcitable focus in somatosensory cortex of these rats, which has been attributed to the deficits in the GABAergic system. In the current study, we studied the changes of calcium binding proteins (CaBPs) in somatosensory cortex (S1) of the 2 and 8 month-old WAG/Rij rats and their age-matched Wistar Albino controls by investigating the expression levels of CaBPs (calbindin, calretinin and parvalbumin) in western blotting. Since WAG/Rij rats showed the low expression level of parvalbumin (PV) in western blots in comparison to Wistar Albino rats, we selectively investigated the number of PV positive neurons using the immunofluorescence staining method in order to confirm this decrement in the perioral region of somatosensory cortex (S1po). The most critical finding of this study was the age- independent reduction in the expression level of PV in the somatosensory cortex of epileptic rats as demonstrating western blotting. Nevertheless, no significant difference was found among numbers of PV + neuron in the S1po region by immunofluorescence staining concerning both of age and strain dependency. These results suggest that the disruption in the activity of the PV-expressing GABAergic interneurons might be involved in the generation of rather than the age-dependent increase in the SWDs in WAG/Rij rats.
失神癫痫（AE）被归类为遗传性全面性癫痫。WAG/Rij 大鼠被认为是失神癫痫的最有效模型之一。研究指出这些大鼠体感皮层存在超兴奋性焦点，这归因于 GABA 能系统的缺陷。在本研究中，我们通过 Western blot 研究了 2 个月和 8 个月大的 WAG/Rij 大鼠和同龄 Wistar Albino 对照组的体感皮层（S1）中钙结合蛋白（CaBPs）的变化，研究了 CaBPs（钙结合蛋白、钙调蛋白和钙调蛋白）的表达水平。由于 WAG/Rij 大鼠在 Western blot 中与 Wistar Albino 大鼠相比，钙调蛋白（PV）的表达水平较低，我们选择使用免疫荧光染色方法来选择性研究 PV 阳性神经元的数量，以证实体感皮层（S1po）口周区域的这种减少。这项研究的最关键发现是，在癫痫大鼠的体感皮层中，PV 的表达水平与年龄无关，这表明 Western blot 存在年龄依赖性降低。然而，通过免疫荧光染色，无论年龄和品系依赖性如何，在 S1po 区域中，PV+神经元的数量均无显著差异。这些结果表明，PV 表达的 GABA 能中间神经元活性的破坏可能参与了 SWD 在 WAG/Rij 大鼠中的产生，而不是年龄依赖性增加。
