Effects Of Ginsenoside On Rats' Behaviors And Serotonin Of Cns During Sleep Deprivation

Sleep is physiologically and psychologically necessary for animal, and a good sleep plays an important role in development of animal. Sleep deprivation (SD) often occurs in modern life when learning or on duty at night. SD can cause obvious effect on working efficiency and safety, especially in military field. Therefore, it is important to explore the strategy to cope with SD.Enormous researches on SD have been done abroad while domestic research just began. The previous study on coping strategy of SD mainlyfocused on stimulants such as amphetamines and caffeine and benzodiazepines. These drugs, however, have distinct side-effects such as drug-resistance and addiction. Panax ginseng, a species of traditional Chinese medicine, has been applied in China for more than two thousand years. And ginsenoside(GS) is its main pharmacologically acting ingredient. Many researches have been showed that GS has an obvious learning and memory facilitating effect on animals with impaired memory. For this reason, GS was employed to cope with SD in the present study. The effects of GS on behaviors and serotonin of CNS were investigated in rats under sleep deprivation, and this will facilitate the search for strategy of coping with SD in traditional Chinese medicine.In the present study, the effects of GS on learning, memory, activity and serotonin of CNS of rats were explored under different sleep deprivations. The completely random design was adopted, and SD was induced in adult, healthy and male Sprague-Dawlay rats by "Flower Pot" technique. Forced feeding of GS to the experimental group rats continuously for 5 days before SD. Immediately before and after SD, the behaviors including learning, memory and activity of rats were tested in Y-maze test, Step-down test and Open-field test(OFT) among four groups. At the same time, the weight and temperature were measured. Serotonin of CNS in rats was evaluated by Immunocyto-chemistry and Image Analysis System.The main findings are as follows:1. Learning and memory of rats were unpaired during SD, and the effect may enhance with the increase of SD time. GS can improve the impairment effectively, and the effect reaches its climax at 72h after SD.2. Spontaneous activity of rats will turn from excitation to inhibition withthe increase of SD time. GS can improve rats' activity so as to guarantee working efficiency. The effect reaches its climax at 72h after SD, too.3. The weight of rats will decrease after SD. GS can improve the loss, and the effect mainly occurs after 48h of SD. And the effect reaches its climax at 96h after SD.4. Immunocytochemistry shows that seretonin distributes in raphe ceruleus of brain stem mainly. Seretonin obviously increases after SD, and the effect enhances with the increase of SD time. GS can improve the impairment, and the effect reaches its climax after 72h of SD.