Centella asiatica suppresses the Glutamate Excitotoxicity Occurred due to Pentylenetetrazole (PTZ) Induced Epilepsy

Author(s)

Visweswari, G., Swathi, G., Rajendra, W.

Author's Affiliation

Abstract

Epilepsy has long been known to be associated with cell injury and cell death in brain. Such seizure-related neuronal injury has been assumed to be mediated by glutamate, the excitatory amino acid in the central nervous system. The present study was undertaken to gain insights into the mechanism of action of different extracts of Centella asiatica (C. asiatica) in PTZ-induced seizures by concomitantly assessing the alterations in selected facets of glutamate metabolism viz., glutamine content, glutamate dehydrogenase (GDH), glutamine synthetase (GS), glutaminase, and glutamic acid decarboxylase (GAD) activities. Male Wistar rats (150±25g) were divided into 8 groups having 6 in each group: (a) Control rats treated with saline (b) Pentylenetetrazole (PTZ)-induced epileptic group (60mg/Kg, i.p.) (c) Epileptic group pre-treated with n-hexane extract (nHE) (d) Epileptic group pre-treated with chloroform extract (CE) (e) Epileptic group pre-treated with ethyl acetate extract (EAE) (f) Epileptic group pre-treated with n-butanol extract (nBE ) and (g) Epileptic group pre-treated with aqueous extract (AE) and (h) Epileptic group pre-treated with diazepam (DZ). Glutamine content and the activities of GDH, GAD, and GS, in general, were decreased in different regions of brain during PTZ-induced epilepsy and the activities were increased in epileptic rats pre-treated with different extracts of C. asiatica except CE and AE. At the same time glutaminase activity was increased in PTZ-induced epileptic animals and decreased with C. asiatica extracts except AE. Our findings suggest that the antiepileptic action of different extracts of C. asiatica against PTZ-induced seizures is associated with a prompt attenuation of extracellular glutamate overflow.

Keywords

Centella asiatica, Pentylenetetrazole, Epilepsy, Antiepileptic effect, Glutamine, Glutamine synthetase, Glutaminase and Glutamate dehydrogenase

Cite This Article

Visweswari, G., Swathi, G., & Rajendra, W. (2014). Centella asiatica Suppresses the Glutamate Excitotoxicity Occurred due to Pentylenetetrazole (PTZ) Induced Epilepsy. International Journal for Pharmaceutical Research Scholars (IJPRS), 3(2), 38-47.