Administration of Antagomir-223 Inhibits Apoptosis, Promotes Angiogenesis and Functional Recovery in Rats with Spinal Cord Injury

作者：Liu, Da^*; Huang, Ying; Jia, Changqing; Li, Yan; Liang, Feng; Fu, Qin

来源：Cellular and Molecular Neurobiology, 2015, 35(4): 483-491.

DOI：10.1007/s10571-014-0142-x

• Spinal cord injury (SCI)
• Antagomir-223
• Apoptosis
• Angiogenesis
• Functional recovery

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are recently described as a class of short non-coding RNAs, which play important roles in post-transcriptional gene regulation and involved in many physiological and pathological processes. MicroRNA-223 (miR-223) has been showed highly elevated in the injured spinal cord. However, the potential role and underlying mechanisms of miR-223 in spinal cord injury (SCI) were incompletely understood. In the present study, we observed the persistent high levels of miR-223 in the injured spinal cord at different time points (1, 3, 7, and 14 days) after SCI. Besides, inhibiting miR-223 by intrathecally injection with antagomir-223 significantly improved recovery in hindlimb motor function and attenuated cell apoptosis in spinal cord-injured rats. Additionally, antagomir-223 treatment markedly decreased the pro-apoptotic protein levels, including Bax and cleaved caspase-3, up-regulated the anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 protein level, as well as the expression of GluR2. Moreover, inhibition of miR-223 promoted angiogenesis, as evidenced by the increased CD31 expression and microvascular density. Taken together, our results indicate that inhibition of miR-223 with antagomir-223 exerts protective role in functional recovery, angiogenesis, and anti-apoptosis during SCI. Thereby, miR-223 may be a promising target of therapy for SCI.

• 出版日期2015-5
• 单位中国医科大学