Fig. 3: Pharmacological treatment with guanabenz reduces neuronal death induced by SCI and improves functional recovery. | Cell Death & Disease

Fig. 3: Pharmacological treatment with guanabenz reduces neuronal death induced by SCI and improves functional recovery.

From: Restoration of ER proteostasis attenuates remote apoptotic cell death after spinal cord injury by reducing autophagosome overload

Fig. 3

A Time course of functional recovery measured by Beam-walking test showing the score of SCI-sal and SCI-Guana rats (N = 17 mice/group, m/f = 10/7; Two-way repeated measures ANOVA, (time × treatment: time p < 0.0001; treatment p = 0.0002; interaction: time × treatment p < 0.0001) **p < 0.001; ***p < 0.0001. B Box-and-whisker plots showing the percentage of surviving neurons in RN of SCI-sal and SCI-Guana rats measured by stereological analysis (N = 5 rats/group, m/f = 3/2; Unpaired t test with Welch’s correction p = 0.0036) **p < 0.001. C Representative immunoblots and densitometric box-and-whisker plots showing the level of cytochrome-c (cyt-c) released in the cytoplasm, cleaved Caspase-3 (cl. Casp-3), Bcl-2/Bax ratio normalized to GAPDH used as loading control in the SCI-sal and SCI-Guana groups (N = 5 rats/group, m/f = 3/2; Unpaired t test with Welch’s correction p = 0.0049 Bcl-2/bax ratio; p = 0.0019 cyt-c; p = 0.0005 Caspase-3) **p < 0.001; ***p < 0.0001. D The experimental protocol used in this section to investigate the long-lasting effects of guanabenz treatment. Adult rats underwent spinal cord injury (SCI) received guanabenz (8 mg/Kg i.p. once a day) or saline for 5 days. After that, the treatment was suspended and animals were divided into two groups: a group of animals was left to survive another 16 days after the end of treatment and sacrificed at day 21; the second group was left to survive another 55 days after the end of treatment and sacrificed 60 days after injury. E Time course of functional recovery measured by Beam-walking test showing the score of SCI-sal and SCI-Guana rats (N = 6 rats/group, m/f = 4/2; Two-way RM ANOVA (time × treatment: time p < 0.0001; treatment p = 0.0001; interaction: time × treatment p < 0.0001) **p < 0.001; ***p < 0.0001. F Box-and-whisker plots showing the percentage of surviving neurons in RN of SCI-sal and SCI-Guana rats at different time points (5, 21, and 60 days after injury) measured by stereological analysis (N = 5 mice/group, m/f = 3/2; Unpaired t test with Welch’s correction p = 0.0011) **p < 0.001.

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