Embelin Prevents Seizure and Associated Cognitive Impairments in a Pentylenetetrazole-Induced Kindling Zebrafish Model

Conclusion Herein, we conclude that EMB suppresses seizure-like behavior and improves cognitive function altered due to a chronic epilepsy condition. EMB significantly modulates inflammatory genes affected by seizure and also affects neurotransmitter levels, which eventually improves the cognitive status of the animals. Moreover, behavioral observation, neurotransmitter analysis and gene expression results suggest that EMB can reverse learning and memory dysfunction associated with chronic epilepsy in a zebrafish model. Though we developed a KA-induced seizure model, we did not assess the ameliorative effect of embelin against KA-induced seizure and related cognitive alterations as a single KA dose did not produce chronic epilepsy like behavior similar to PTZ kindling. We acknowledge this part as a limitation of the current study. However, overall findings suggest that EMB has potential therapeutic value for the management of epilepsy and related cognitive alterations in experimental studies. However, further work is highly recommended to evaluate the therapeutic effects of EMB against genetic models and to compare its efficacy with current AEDs. Ethics Statement The experimental protocol was approved by the MARP Animal Ethics Committee, Monash University, Australia (MUM/2017/03 and MARP/2017/003). Author Contributions UK performed the experiment, analysis of the results and writing of the manuscript. YP contributed to manuscript writing, result analysis and proofr...
Source: Frontiers in Pharmacology - Category: Drugs & Pharmacology Source Type: research