title: Pretreatment with a competitive NMDA antagonist D-CPPene attenuates focal cerebral infarction and brain swelling in awake rats.
abstract: The purpose of the study was to assess effects of the competitive N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonist D-(E)-4-(3-phosphonoprop-2-enyl)piperazine-2-carboxylic acid (D-CPPene) upon focal cerebral infarction and brain oedema in the rat. Focal cerebral ischaemia was produced by permanent occlusion of the middle cerebral artery under halothane anaesthesia. The anaesthetic gas was discontinued immediately after the occlusion and the rats were killed 24 hours later. Cerebral infarction and brain swelling were each assessed on the frozen brain sections at 8 predetermined coronal planes. Pretreatment with D-CPPene (4.5 mg/kg i.v. followed by continuous infusion at 3 mg/kg/h until sacrifice) 15 minutes prior to MCA occlusion, significantly reduced the volume of infarction in the cerebral hemisphere by 29% (p < 0.05). Brain swelling, obtained by subtracting the nonischaemic hemispheric volume from the ischaemic hemispheric volume, was significantly reduced with D-CPPene treatment and the mean reduction in swelling (34% less than the controls: p < 0.001) proportionately similar to the decrease in infarct volume in the same animals. These data indicate that systemic administration of the competitive NMDA receptor antagonist D-CPPene has neuroprotective effects against ischaemic brain damage, and the reduction in brain swelling occurs in parallel with the reduction in ischaemic damage.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosurgery, Catholic University Medical College, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: C K
authors.initials: CK
authors.lastname: Park
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: McCulloch
authors.forename: J K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Kang
authors.forename: C R
authors.initials: CR
authors.lastname: Choi
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001929:Brain Edema / Q000473:pathology*; D002421:Caudate Nucleus / Q000187:drug effects / Q000473:pathology; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000187:drug effects / Q000473:pathology; D002544:Cerebral Infarction / Q000473:pathology*; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology; D008297:Male; D010879:Piperazines / Q000494:pharmacology*; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D016194:Receptors, N-Methyl-D-Aspartate / Q000037:antagonists & inhibitors* / Q000502:physiology
chemical_list: D010879:Piperazines; D016194:Receptors, N-Methyl-D-Aspartate; C065286:SDZ EAA 494