title: Postnatal treadmill exercise alleviates short-term memory impairment by enhancing cell proliferation and suppressing apoptosis in the hippocampus of rat pups born to diabetic rats.
abstract: During pregnancy, diabetes mellitus exerts detrimental effects on the development of the fetus, especially the central nervous system. In the current study, we evaluated the effects of postnatal treadmill exercise on short-term memory in relation with cell proliferation and apoptosis in the hippocampus of rat pups born to streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic maternal rats. Adult female rats were mated with male rats for 24 h. Two weeks after mating, the pregnant female rats were divided into two groups: control group and STZ injection group. The pregnant rats in the STZ injection group were administered 40 mg/kg of STZ intraperitoneally. After birth, the rat pups were divided into the following four groups: control group, control with postnatal exercise group, maternal STZ-injection group, and maternal STZ-injection with postnatal exercise group. The rat pups in the postnatal exercise groups were made to run on a treadmill for 30 min once a day, 5 times per week for 2 weeks beginning 4 weeks after birth. The rat pups born to diabetic rats were shown to have short-term memory impairment with suppressed cell proliferation and increased apoptosis in the hippocampal dentate gyrus. Postnatal treadmill exercise alleviated short-term memory impairment by increased cell proliferation and suppressed apoptosis in the rat pups born to diabetic rats. These findings indicate that postnatal treadmill exercise may be used as a valuable strategy to ameliorate neurodevelopmental problems in children born to diabetics.
authors.affiliation: Department of Urology, Gachon University Gil Medical Center, Gachon University School of Medicine, Incheon, Korea.
authors.forename: Young Hoon
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Therapy, College of Natural Science, Kyungnam University, Changwon, Korea.
authors.forename: Yun-Hee
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Sung
authors.affiliation: Department of Sports Science, College of Life Science and Nano Technology, Hannam University, Daejeon, Korea.
authors.forename: Hee-Hyuk
authors.initials: HH
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology, College of Medicine, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Il-Gyu
authors.initials: IG
authors.lastname: Ko
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology, College of Medicine, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Sung-Eun
authors.initials: SE
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology, College of Medicine, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Mal-Soon
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Shin
authors.affiliation: KBS Institute of the Sports, Arts and Science, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Bo-Kyun
authors.initials: BK
authors.lastname: Kim
keywords: Apoptosis; Cell proliferation; Diabetic rats; Hippocampal dentate gyrus; Rat pups; Treadmill exercise