Journal Article

Cortical Gene Expression in the Vitamin E-Deficient Rat

Stoecklin, Elisabeth, Muller, David, Hyland, Stephen, Barella, Luca, Hayton, Samantha

2006

Overview

In mammals, severe and chronic deficiency of vitamin E (α- tocopherol) is associated with a characteristic neurological syndrome. Previously, we have shown that this syndrome is accompanied by electrophysiological abnormalities of neural and visual function. To investigate the molecular basis of the observed abnormalities, we used microarrays to monitor the expression of ~ 14,000 genes in the cerebral cortex from rats which had received diets containing 0, 1.25 and 5.0 mg/ kg diet of all-rac-α-tocopheryl acetate for 14 months. Compared to the groups receiving 1.25 and 5.0 mg/kg α-tocopheryl acetate, a total of 11 genes were statistically significantly upregulated (≥ 1.3-fold) and 34 downregulated (≤1.3-fold) in the vitamin E-deficient group. Increased expression was observed for the genes encoding the antioxidant enzyme catalase and the axon guidance molecule tenascin-R, while decreased expression was detected for genes encoding protein components of myelin and determinants of neuronal signal propagation. Thus our observations suggest that vitamin E deficiency results in transcriptional alterations in the cerebral cortex of the rat which are consistent with the observed neurological and electrophysiological alterations.

• Publisher: S. Karger AG,Karger
• Subject: abnormal development / administration & dosage / alpha-tocopherol / alpha-Tocopherol - administration & dosage / animal disease models / Animals / Biological and medical sciences / Brain / Catalase / Catalase - metabolism / cerebral cortex / Cerebral Cortex - metabolism / Cerebral Cortex - physiopathology / complications / Diet / etiology / evoked potentials / Eyes & eyesight / Gene expression / Gene Expression Profiling / Male / Medical sciences / Metabolic diseases / metabolism / microarray technology / Nervous System Diseases / Nervous System Diseases - etiology / Nervous System Diseases - metabolism / Nutrition / Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis / Original Paper / physiopathology / Rats / Rats, Wistar / Rodents / Transcription, Genetic / vision / vision disorders / Vision Disorders - etiology / Vision Disorders - metabolism / vitamin deficiencies / Vitamin E / Vitamin E Deficiency / Vitamin E Deficiency - complications / Vitamins / Vitamins - administration & dosage