Effect Of Electroacupuncture On Expression Of PS1 Protein And NCT Protein In Hippocampus Of SAMP8 Mice

Background:Alzheimer’s disease is a degenerative disease of the central nervous system. Its main clinical manifestations included progressive behavior disorders, memory impairment, cognitive changes and some psychiatric abnormalities. As the world population aging process gradually increased, the incidence and prevalence of AD is correspondingly increased year by year. AD was not only a serious threat to the health and living quality or a psychological burden to patients, but also a economic burden to their families and a heavy pressure to society, which had become a serious medical and social problem. Therefore, the prevention and treatment of AD has become one of the most important topic in the research field of senile disease, raised the concern of the government and the medical community. As the elderly population in the world’s population increased, the prevalence of AD increased with the age and the incidence of AD was also rising. At the age of 65-85 years old crowd; the prevalence of AD rate is about 5%. More than 85 years of age population, the prevalence of AD rate is about 40%. Therefore, the treatment of AD costs soaring trend year by year, has caused huge economic pay. While the China traditional medicine for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease has the advantages of economy, fewer side effects, etc. Alzheimer’s disease belonging to category of Chinese medicine as "dementia", and acupuncture had definitely effect to this disease. But these studies had not yet been fully demonstrated the effectiveness of Acupuncture in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. This paper is divided into three parts, the first part was the literature review, second part was experimental research, the third part were analysis and discussion.Objective:To research the efffect of Electro-acupuncture on the PS1 protein and NCT protein expression in the hippocampus of mice SAMP8, and discuss the mechanism of the EA treatment on AD.Methods:Twenty 8-month-old SAMP8 mice were randomly divided into model group and EA group, with ten SAMR1 mice as the normal control group. All the groups feed in normal environment. Model group and normal group should be caught and bounded once when the EA group is being treated. "Baihui"、"Yintang"、"Renzhong" were selected as the EA treat points for EA group 20 min a day for 15 days. The current frequency is 2 Hz and current strength is appropriate when the head of mice is quivering. The learning-memorize ability of mice was assessed by Morris water maze when the treatment finished. Immunohistochemistral method was used to observe the PS1 protein and NCT protein expression in the hippocampus of mice. The contents of PS1 protein and NCT protein in hippocampus was tested by Western Blot.Result:The Morris water maze test showed the escape latency of model group increased,the number of platform-site crossover and the swimming duration in platform quadrant of model group were reduced compared with the control group (P<0.05, P<0.01); the escape latency of EA group reduced, while the crossing time and dwell time in the target quadrant increased compared with the model group(P<0.05). The Immunohistochemistral result showed that the PS1 protein and NCT protein in the hippocampus of EA group obviously decreased compared with the model group (P<0.01). The Western Blot result showed the contents of PS1 protein and NCT protein in the model group were higher than that in the control group (P<0.01) while the EA group could reduce its expression (P<0.01).Conclusion:EA therapy can improve the learning-memorize ability of the SAMP8 mice and decrease the protein contents of PS1 and NCT protein in hippocampus. The EA treatment might be a promising method to AD patients.