Back to Archived Journals » Journal of Neurorestoratology » Volume 1
Lipoic acid enhances survival of transplanted neural stem cells by reducing transplantation-associated injury
Authors Gao J, Thonhoff JR, Dunn TJ, Wu P
Received 6 February 2013
Accepted for publication 20 May 2013
Published 23 July 2013 Volume 2013:1 Pages 1—12
DOI https://doi.org/10.2147/JN.S43745
Checked for plagiarism Yes
Review by Single anonymous peer review
Peer reviewer comments 4
Junling Gao,1,* Jason R Thonhoff,1,2,* Tiffany J Dunn,1 Ping Wu1
1Department of Neuroscience and Cell Biology, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, TX, USA; 2Department of Neurology, The Methodist Hospital, Houston, TX, USA
*These authors contributed equally to this work
Abstract: The efficacy of stem cell-based therapy for neurological diseases depends highly on cell survival post-transplantation. One of the key factors affecting cell survival is the grafting procedure. The current study aims to determine whether needle insertion into intact rat spinal cords creates a hypoxic environment that is prone to lipid peroxidation damage upon reperfusion, and whether an antioxidant protects human neural stem cells (hNSCs) both in vitro and post-transplantation into rat spinal cords. We show here that a single needle injection creates a hypoxic environment within the rat spinal cord that peaks at approximately 12 hours before reperfusion occurs. Lipid peroxidation damage at the transplantation site is evident by 48 hours post-needle insertion. In an in vitro model, hypoxia-reperfusion results in apoptotic death of hNSCs. Pretreatment with the antioxidant, α-lipoic acid, protects hNSCs against hypoxia-reperfusion injury and oxidative stress–mediated cell death. Increasing glutathione, but not Akt signaling, contributes to the protective effect of lipoic acid. Pretreating hNSCs with lipoic acid also increases the cell survival rate 1 month post-transplantation. Further investigation is warranted to develop improved techniques to maximize the survival of transplanted stem cells.
Keywords: neural stem cell, transplantation, hypoxia-reperfusion, antioxidant, cell survival, lipoic acid
© 2013 The Author(s). This work is published and licensed by Dove Medical Press Limited. The full terms of this license are available at https://www.dovepress.com/terms.php and incorporate the Creative Commons Attribution - Non Commercial (unported, v3.0) License. By accessing the work you hereby accept the Terms. Non-commercial uses of the work are permitted without any further permission from Dove Medical Press Limited, provided the work is properly attributed. For permission for commercial use of this work, please see paragraphs 4.2 and 5 of our Terms.