The protective role of DL-?-lipoic acid in the oxidative vulnerability triggered by A?-amyloid vaccination in mice

Recent reports indicate that β-amyloid peptide (Aβ) vaccine based therapy for Alzheimer's disease (AD) may be on the horizon. There are however, concerns about the safety of this approach. Immunization with Aβ has several disadvantages, because it crosses the blood brain barrier and cause inflammation and neurotoxicity. The present work is aimed to study the protective effective of α-lipoic acid (LA) in the oxidative vulnerability of β-amyloid in plasma, liver, spleen and brain, when Aβ fibrils are given intraperitoneally in inflammation induced mice. Result shows that reactive oxygen species (ROS) in the astrocytes of inflammation induced mice along with Aβ (IA) has shown 2.5-fold increase when compared with LA treated mice. The increased level of lipid peroxidase (LPO) (p < 0.05) and decreased antioxidant status (p < 0.05) were observed in the plasma, liver, spleen and brain of IA induced mice when compared with LA treated mice. Data shows that there were no significant changes observed between the control and LA treated mice. Our biochemical and histological results highlight that significant oxidative vulnerability was observed in IA treated mice, which was prevented by LA therapy. Our findings suggest that the antioxidant effect of LA when induced with Aβ may serve as a potent therapeutic tool for inflammatory AD models. (Mol Cell Biochem 270: 29-37, 2005)[PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]