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. 2017 Jul 24;7(1):6266.
doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-06552-x.

Puerarin ameliorated the behavioral deficits induced by chronic stress in rats

Zhi-Kun Qiu  1   2 , Guan-Hua Zhang  3 , De-Sheng Zhong  4 , Jia-Li He  5 , Xu Liu  6   7 , Ji-Sheng Chen  8 , Da-Nian Wei  9
Affiliations

Puerarin ameliorated the behavioral deficits induced by chronic stress in rats

Zhi-Kun Qiu et al. Sci Rep. .

Abstract

The present study aimed to investigate the mechanisms underlying the antidepressant-like effects of puerarin via the chronic unpredictable stress (CUS) procedure in rats. Similar to Sertraline (Ser), Chronic treatment of puerarin (60 and 120 mg/kg, i.g) elicited the antidepressant-like effects by reversing the decreased sucrose preference in sucrose preference test (SPT), by blocking the increased latency to feed in novelty-suppressed feeding test (NSFT) and the increased immobility time in forced swimming test (FST) without affecting locomotor activity. However, acute puerarin treatment did not ameliorate the antidepressant- and anxiolytic- like effects in FST and NSFT, respectively. In addition, enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and high performance liquid chromatography-electrochemical detection (HPLC-ECD) showed that chronic treatment of puerarin (60 and 120 mg/kg, i.g) reversed the decreased levels of progesterone, allopregnanolone, serotonin (5-HT) and 5-Hydroxyindoleacetic acid (5-HIAA) in prefrontal cortex and hippocampus of post-CUS rats. Furthermore, puerarin (60 and 120 mg/kg, i.g) blocked the increased corticotropin releasing hormone (CRH), corticosterone (Cort) and adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH). Collectively, repeated administration of puerarin alleviated the behavioral deficits induced by chronic stress which was associated with the biosynthesis of neurosteroids, normalization of serotonergic system and preventing HPA axis dysfunction.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The outline of design for behavioral tests and the schedule of drug treatment.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Puerarin attenuated the CUS-induced behavioral deficits in SPT. # p < 0.05 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (−) group; *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (+) group (n = 10 per group).
Figure 3
Figure 3
Puerarin attenuated the CUS-induced behavioral deficits in NSFT. The latency to feed was increased by CUS and reversed by puerarin. ## p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (−) group; *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (+) group (n = 10 per group).
Figure 4
Figure 4
Puerarin attenuated the CUS-induced behavioral deficits in FST. # p < 0.05 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (−) group; * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (+) group (n = 10 per group).
Figure 5
Figure 5
The effects of puerarin on locomotor activity. None of the treatments altered the number of line crossings (A), rears (B), and fecal pallets (C) in OFT. The body weights (D) were not altered by puerarin (n = 10 per group).
Figure 6
Figure 6
The effects of puerarin on levels of progesterone and allopregnanolone in the prefrontal cortex (A,C) and hippocampus (B,D), respectively. # p < 0.05, ## p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (−) group; * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (+) group (n = 6 per group).
Figure 7
Figure 7
The effects of puerarin on Cort (A), CRH (B), ACTH (C) in serum. # p < 0.05, ## p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (−) group; *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01 vs. vehicle-treated CUS (+) group (n = 6 per group).
Figure 8
Figure 8
The acute effects of puerarin on FST and EPMT. In FST, there was no significant effect on the immobility time in pretest (A) and test (B) duration among groups. Similar to FST (15 mg/kg, i.g), both drugs did not induce the anxiolytic-like effects in EPMT, as evidenced by that the percentage of the time (C)/entries (D) into open arms and total time (E)/entries (F) in arms among groups were not different. (n = 10 per group).
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