Influence of moxibustion on NR2B and PKMζ after neural stem cell transplantation in the rats with vascular dementia

Objective:To observe the influence of moxibustion on learning and memory ability in the rats with vascular dementia(VD) and explore the potential effect mechanism.Methods:A total of 80 rats,screened by Morris water maze,were randomly divided into a shamoperation group,a model group,a neural stem cells(NSCs) group,a NSCs+piracetam group and a NSCs+moxibustion group,16 rats in each group.After corresponding treatments,Morris water maze and immunofluorescence technique were adopted to evaluate the therapeutic effect respectively.Results:Comparison among groups after modeling:compared with the sham-operation group,the escape latency was longer(P<0.01) and the times of crossing platform were reduced(P<0.01) in the rats of the model group.Comparison among groups after treatment:compared with the model group,the escape latency was shortened(P<0.01) and the times of crossing platform were increased(P<0.05) in the rats of the NSCs group.Compared with the NSCs group,the escape latency was shorter and the expressions of the hippocampus NR2B/EGFP and PKM ξ/EGFP expression level increased(all P<0.05) in the rats of the NSCs+piracetam group and the NSCs+moxibustion group(all P <0.05).Compared with the NSCs+piracetam group,the escape latency was shorter and the expressions of the hippocampus NR2B/EGFP and PKM ξ/EGFP expression level were higher in the rats of the moxibustion+NSCs group(all P<0.05).Conclusion:Moxibustion improves the spatial learning and memory ability of the VD rats and promotes the reconstruction of neurogenesis and synaptic function,which may be related to the up-regulation of the expressions of hippocampus NR2B and PKMξ expressions.