| Summary: | 碩士 === 臺灣大學 === 食品科技研究所 === 98 === According to the report of department of Health, Executive Yuan, the event of suicide-caused death is getting more from 1987 to 2008. WHO reported that 80-100% of suicided people are the patients with mental disorder, especially depression. Most patients with depression had the hyperactivity of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA axis) which induces over-excretion of glucocorticoids such as corticosterone (Cort) and accumulation of excitatory amino acids (EAA) such as glutamate, and then results in high activation of calcium channel and overloading of intracellular calcium. Accumulated calcium ions in mitochondrial change mitochondrial membrane permeability and release apoptosis-related factors to cytosol to induce cell death via apoptosis. The loss of neuron cells is related to depression. Gastrodia elata Bl., a traditional Chinese medicine, exhibits lots of bioactivities, including anticonvulsion, antioxidation, etc. Our previous study demonstrated that water extract of Gastrodia elata Bl. (WEGE) has an antidepressive effect and an ability to modulate the amounts of monoamines in the rat brain. In the present study, neuroprotective effect of WEGE and possible active compounds on the Cort-induced lesion in PC12 cells was investigated to understand the antidepression mechanism of WEGE. The result of HPLC analysis indicated that 4-hydroxybenzyl alcohol (HBA) might be one of the potential active compounds with antidepressive ability in WEGE. Both of WEGE and HBA inhibited the Cort-induced decrease of cell viability and increase of percentage of sub-G1, concentration of intracellular calcium, and activity of caspase-3. Additionally, WEGE and HBA inhibited the Cort-induced increase of pro-apoptotic Bax and cleaved PARP protein expression, while they also maintained the decrease of anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 and pro-caspase-9 protein expression those caused by Cort in PC12 cells. Therefore, WEGE and HBA protected PC12 cells from the cort-induced apoptosis accompanied with increased the intracellular calcium concentration, and it suggested that one of the
depression mechanism of WEGE is to decrease the loss of neuron cells.
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