Effect of nicotine against apoptosis of rat cortical neurons induced by colchicines

AIM: To explore the mechanism of nicotine against the apoptosis induced by colchicines in rat cortical neurons.METHODS: Cortical neurons were cultured from newborn Sprague-Dawley(SD) rats(less than 12 h).The rate of apoptosis was measured by Hoechst33258 fluorescence staining in the neurons,and the activity of Akt473 was analyzed by assay kit Akt473.RESULTS: The apoptosis of cortical neurons can be induced by 0.1 μmol/L colchicine.The phosphorlation of Akt 473 decreased significantly(1/3 times of the control group,P0.01).However,when cortical neurons pretreated with 10 μmol/L nicotine for 2 h were cultured with 0.1 μmol/L colchicine for 24 h,the rate of apoptosis decreased from 62% to 38%.The phosphorlation of Akt473 increased significantly in a bell-shape time-dependent manner,which was respectively 1.3,3.7,2.4,2.1 and 1.9 times compared with the control group(P0.01).CONCLUSION: By activating the signal pathway of Akt473,nicotine may attenuate the apoptosis of cortical neurons induced by colchicines.