PROTECTIVE EFFECTS FOLIC ACID AND VITAMIN B12 ON SPATIAL LEARNING AND MEMORY IN RATS MODEL OF ALZHEIMER S DISEASE

Background and Aim: Alzheimer s disease (AD) is multifactorial brain impairment and the causes remains unknown. But, numerous retrospective and prospective studies have demonstrated that hyperhomocysteinemia (HHcy) certainly represents one cause of these. Dietary deficiency of folate and B12 results in a significant increase of HHcy levels. The present study aimed to examine the effect of Folic Acid and Vitamin B12 in rats model of Alzheimer s disease.Methods: In this study 49 adult male Wistar rats were divided into 7 groups: control, lesion which received bilateral electric lesions of nucleus basalis magnocellularis (NBM), sham (the electrode was entered into the NBM with no lesion), lesion+5mg/kg Folic Acid, lesion+10 mg/kg B12, lesion+5mg/kg Folic Acid-10 mg/kg B12, Vehicle (lesion+0.2 mL saline). B12 and saline were injected intraperitoneally (i.p.) immediately after lesion for 10 days and folic acid 30 minutes after lesion for 7 days. After one week, the rats were trained to perform the Y-maze task for five days.Results: In this study, the results showed that the bilateral lesion of NBM impaired the spatial learning compared to the control and sham groups (P<0.001). No effect on spatial learning was seen saline group compared with the lesion group. Also in the lesion+5mg/kg Folic Acid group there was no effect on spatial learning. The treatment with Folic Acid and B12 in groups, lesion+10 mg/kg B12 (P<0.05), lesion+5mg/kg Folic Acid-10 mg/kg B12 (P<0.01), significantly improved spatial learning.Conclusion: The results of this study indicate that Treatment with Folic Acid and vitamin B12 improves memory and spatial learning defects in rats model of Alzheimer s disease in the Y-maze task.

کلیدواژه ها:

Folic Acid ، vitamin B12 ، Spatial learning ، Nucleus basalis of magnocellularis ، Alzheimer’s disease