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Leuprolide Acetate, a GnRH Agonist, Improves Experimental Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis: A Possible Therapy for Multiple Sclerosis

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Abstract

Gonadotrophin-releasing hormone (GnRH), a well known hypothalamic neuropeptide, has been reported to possess neurotrophic properties. Leuprolide acetate, a synthetic analogue of GnRH is considered to be a very safe and tolerable drug and it has been used for diverse clinical applications, including the treatment of prostate cancer, endometriosis, uterine fibroids, central precocious puberty and in vitro fertilization techniques. The present study was designed to determine whether Leuprolide acetate administration, exerts neurotrophic effects on clinical signs, body weight gain, neurofilaments (NFs) and myelin basic protein (MBP) expression, axonal morphometry and cell infiltration in spinal cord of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) rats. In this work, we have found that Leuprolide acetate treatment decreases the severity of clinical signs of locomotion, induces a significantly greater body weight gain, increases the MBP and NFs expression, axonal area and cell infiltration in EAE animals. These results suggest the use of this agonist as a potential therapeutic approach for multiple sclerosis.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Dr. Kalman Kovacs for reviewing the manuscript and to Dr. Andrés Quintanar-Stephano and Lic. Denisse Calderón Vallejo for the methodological support. We thank to the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACyT) for scholarship 266788.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Neurophysiology, Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, Centro de Ciencias Básicas, Universidad Autónoma de Aguascalientes, Av. Universidad 940, C.P. 20131, Aguascalientes, Mexico

    Irene Guzmán-Soto, Irma Hernández-Jasso & J. Luis Quintanar

  2. Laboratory of Immunology, Department of Microbiology, Centro de Ciencias Básicas, Universidad Autónoma de Aguascalientes, Av. Universidad 940, C.P. 20131, Aguascalientes, Mexico

    Eva Salinas

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  1. Irene Guzmán-Soto
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  2. Eva Salinas
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  4. J. Luis Quintanar
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Correspondence to J. Luis Quintanar.

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Guzmán-Soto, I., Salinas, E., Hernández-Jasso, I. et al. Leuprolide Acetate, a GnRH Agonist, Improves Experimental Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis: A Possible Therapy for Multiple Sclerosis. Neurochem Res 37, 2190–2197 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11064-012-0842-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11064-012-0842-x

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