DAF displayed a biphasic effect on C3a generation triggered during the exposure of cells to the hypoxic insult. Within the 50 to 200 ng ml range, recombinant selleck chemicals Sunitinib human DAF was able to suppress C3a production in a dose dependent manner. Significant inhibition of C3a was apparent in the presence of 50 ng ml of DAF and reached a maximal level at 200 ng ml. Interestingly, higher doses of DAF did not show complement inhibition. Accordingly, 200 ng ml of DAF was chosen to evaluate the function of DAF in suppressing complement activa tion and neuroprotection. To establish whether DAF displays beneficial effects on neuronal excitability and activity under NaCN induced hypoxia, whole cell patch clamp recordings from rat pri mary cortical neurons were performed. Action potentials were elicited in whole cell current clamp recordings.

Neuronal action potential discharges were observed in all four groups. No significant difference in repetitive firing evoked Inhibitors,Modulators,Libraries by long depolarization pulse and spike frequencies induced by injecting dif ferent depolarization currents was observed Inhibitors,Modulators,Libraries among the groups. Spontaneous plateau depolarization potentials were recorded after 14 days in culture. The pla teau potentials with burst firing were inhibited by excit atory glutamatergic blockers of AMPA and NMDA receptors, CNQX and D AP5. Spontaneous plateau potential with burst firing was used as an index to reflect neural network activity. Spontane ous plateau depolarization Inhibitors,Modulators,Libraries potentials were significantly reduced in hypoxic cells. However, treatment with DAF profoundly reversed the reduction in plateau depolarization potentials induced by NaCN.

Fig ure 2e shows that the duration of plateau potential Inhibitors,Modulators,Libraries with burst firing was considerably shorter in hypoxic neurons compared to controls whereas DAF appears to have cor rected the neural change induced by NaCN. This obser vation suggests that DAF protects neuronal network activity from adverse effects generated by chemical isch emia. DAF prevents dendritic spine loss induced by hypoxia Dendritic spine structures and dynamics are important predictors of the function of neural networks. To investigate the potential effect of DAF on morphological changes of neuronal dendritic spines caused by ischemia like conditions, GFP transfected neurons were subjected to NaCN and subsequently imaged. The number of den dritic spines in each group was counted.

Inhibitors,Modulators,Libraries Spine density measurements were determined by counting spines in the length of a 20 um secondary dendrite from each individ ual neuron. The rate of N N0 was used, N corresponding to the total number of dendritic spines at each time point and selleck chemicals N0 indicating the number before NaCN administra tion. Figure 3a shows time lapse recordings which reveal that NaCN induced morphological alterations which became more pronounced over time. Figures 3a and 3b show that treatment with DAF resulted in significant pro tection against neuronal dendritic spine loss. tained 1. 5 mM NaCN.