The preventive effects of Centaurea maroccana Ball. extract against oxidative stress induced by cisplatin in mice brains: in vitro and in vivo studies

Abstract

Since antiquity, Centaurea species have been used in folk medicine to treat several diseases owing to their potential biological activities that distinguish this genus such as antioxidant, anticancer, and anti-inflammatory effect. The current study aimed to investigate the possible neuroprotective effects of the n-butanol extract of Centaurea maroccana (BECM) against cisplatin (CP) induced neurotoxicity in mice. BECM’s potential neuroprotective properties were studied in vitro and in vivo models. Male Swiss albino mice were orally received BECM (200 mg/kg) for 10 days before a single intraperitoneal injection of cisplatin (8 mg/kg). Vitamin E (100 mg/kg) was given daily by gavage as a positive control. In vitro results revealed that BECM inhibited lipid peroxidation (LPO) levels and acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity. In vivo findings showed that BECM pretreatment was able to regulate lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels and to improve CP-induced cholinergic dysfunction by inhibiting AChE activity in mice brains. Moreover, BECM attenuated CP-provoked oxidative stress by suppressing LPO levels, increasing total antioxidant capacity (TAC) and enhancing the activities of antioxidant enzymes (catalase (CAT), superoxide dismutase (SOD), reduced glutathione (GSH), glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and glutathione S-transferase (GST)) in both brain cytosolic and mitochondrial fractions. The histological analysis exhibited neurotoprotective effect of BECM by protecting the cerebral cortex and reducing the histomorphological alterations resulted by cisplatin. Interestingly, our extract achieved neuroprotection comparable to vitamin E in most evaluated parameters. It appears that protective potency of BECM against CP-induced neurotoxicity could be related to its richness in polyphenols confirmed by liquid-chromatography tandem mass spectrometry analysis (LC-MS/MS).

Keywords:

• Cisplatin
• Centaurea maroccana Ball.
• oxidative stress
• neurotoxicity
• vitamin E
• LC-MS/MS analysis

Acknowledgement

The authors are grateful to the Algerian Ministry of High Education for financial support.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Author contributions

IA: performed all experiments and drafted the manuscript. MB and SA: supervised the study and assisted in the design of the manuscript. AM: performed a data analysis and statistics. RE: performed the LC/MS analysis and assisted in the writing process. Phytochemical studies were carried out under the supervision of SB and FB. All coauthors approve the current version of the manuscript.

Data availability statement

Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analyzed during the current study.