Neuroprotective effects of lovastatin on glutamate induced excitotoxicity in rat cortical neurons

Objective To observe the effect of lovastatin on glutamate induced excitotoxic- ity in rat conical neurons.Methods Conical neurons were prepared from E17 rat.Cell viability was evaluated with trypan blue dye exclusion test and the morphology and number of neurons was assessed with MAP-2 immunofluorescence staining.Results Trypan blue staining demonstrated that lovastatin pre-treatment 3 d,5 d,but not 1 d,significantly protected neurons from glutamate induced excitotoxicity.However,lovastatin did not protect neurons against the apoptosis events in- duced by camptothecin.Immunofluorescence staining demonstrated the number of MAP-2 positive neurons decreased and survival neurons showed a loss of MAP-2 positive dendrites after glutamate treatment,which were not visible after lovastatin pre-treatment.Conclusions Lovastatin signifi- cantly and selectively attenuated glutamate induced excitotoxicity,indicating that lovastatin has po- tential neuroprotective effects on excitotoxicity-related neuropathology.