Time course of dopaminergic cell death and changes in iron, ferritin and transferrin levels in the rat substantia nigra after 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) lesioning
Y. He et al., Time course of dopaminergic cell death and changes in iron, ferritin and transferrin levels in the rat substantia nigra after 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) lesioning, FREE RAD RE, 31(2), 1999, pp. 103
Parkinson's disease is characterized by dopaminergic cell death in the subs
tantia nigra. The underlying mechanism is, however, unknown. Though there a
re increasing lines of evidence showing iron accumulation in the Parkinsoni
an substantia nigra, it still remains obscure whether increased iron is the
primary cause of dopaminergic cell death, or just a consequence of the pat
hological process. It is also unclear how iron gains access to the Parkinso
nian SN. To gain more understanding in these areas, the present study inves
tigated the time course of dopaminergic cell death and of changes in the le
vel of iron, ferritin and transferrin. The results showed that iron was inc
reased after the significant nigral dopaminergic cell death induced by 6-hy
droxydopamine injection into the rat substantia nigra. On the other hand, t
he expression of transferrin was decreased. However, there was a temporal i
ncrease in the number of ferritin positive microglia. The results indicated
that iron increase was not the primary cause of dopaminergic cell death in
the Parkinsonian rat. It was most likely the result of an accumulation of
iron-laden microglia.