PMID: 16626091Apr 22, 2006Paper

Synthes Award for Resident Research on Spinal Cord and Spinal Column Injury: granulocyte macrophage colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF) prevents apoptosis and improves functional outcome in experimental spinal cord contusion injury

Clinical Neurosurgery
Yoon HaHyung Chun Park

Abstract

Granulocyte macrophage colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF) is a potent hematopoietic cytokine, which stimulates stem cell proliferation in the bone marrow and inhibits apoptotic cell death in leukocytes. However, the effects of GM-CSF in the central nervous system are still unclear. The present study was undertaken to determine if GM-CSF can rescue neuronal cells from apoptosis and improve neurologic function in a spinal cord injury (SCI) model. To study the effect of GM-CSF on apoptotic neuronal death, we used a staurosporine-induced neuronal death model in a Neuro 2A (N2A) cell line (in vitro) and in a rat SCI model (in vivo). N2A cells were preincubated with GM-CSF for 60 minutes before being exposed to staurosporine for 24 hours. To inhibit GM-CSF, we pretreated N2A cells with antibodies of the GM-CSF receptor for 60 minutes. SCI was made by clip compression. Rats were treated with daily GM-CSF (20 microg/d) for 5 days. The number of apoptotic cells in the spinal cord and neurologic improvements were checked. GM-CSF pretreatment was found to significantly protect N2A cells from apoptosis, and neutralizing antibodies for the GM-CSF receptors inhibited the rescuing effect of GM-CSF on apoptosis. In the rat SCI model, neurologi...Continue Reading

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Apoptosis

Apoptosis is a specific process that leads to programmed cell death through the activation of an evolutionary conserved intracellular pathway leading to pathognomic cellular changes distinct from cellular necrosis