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Atorvastatin ameliorates depressive behaviors and neuroinflammatory in streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice

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Abstract

Depression is a chronic and progressive syndrome and commonly associated with several neuropsychiatric comorbidities, of which depression is the most studied. It has been demonstrated that statins also have anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory properties, which being explored for potential benefits in depression. However, the role of statins in the treatment of diabetes-related depression has not been well examined. Herein, we investigated the effects of atorvastatin on depressive behaviors and neuroinflammation in streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice. Our data indicated that oral administration of atorvastatin at 10 or 20 mg/kg for 3 weeks markedly ameliorated diabetes-associated depressive behaviors reflected by better performance in sucrose preference test (SPT), tail suspension test (TST), and novelty-suppressed feeding test (NSFT). The study further showed that atrovastatin decreased the expression of nucleus NF-κB p65 expression and ameliorated neuroinflammatory responses in prefrontal cortex as evidenced by less Iba-1-positive cells and lower inflammatory mediators including IL-1β and TNF-α. As expected, atorvastatin-treated diabetic mice exhibited significant improvement of hyperlipidemia rather than hyperglycemia. These results suggest that atorvastatin has the potential to be employed as a therapy for diabetes-related depression.

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Funding

This work was supported by grants from the Science Foundation of the Zhejiang Pharmaceutical Association (2018ZYY43 to Zhang. HN, 2017ZYY20 to Yu. XB) and the Science Foundation of Wenzhou (S20100050 to Liang. J)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pharmacy, Zhejiang Provincial Key Laboratory of Aging and Neurological Disorder Research, The First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, 325000, China

    Zhang Hai-Na, Yu Xu-Ben, Tang Cong-Rong & Liang Jing

  2. Department of Pharmacy, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, 325000, China

    Zhang Hai-Na, Yu Xu-Ben, Tang Cong-Rong, Cao Yan-Cheng, Yang Fan, Xu Lei-Mei, Sun Ruo-Lan,  Ye-Zi, Wang Ye-Xuan & Liang Jing

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  1. Zhang Hai-Na
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Correspondence to Liang Jing.

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Hai-Na, Z., Xu-Ben, Y., Cong-Rong, T. et al. Atorvastatin ameliorates depressive behaviors and neuroinflammatory in streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice. Psychopharmacology 237, 695–705 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00213-019-05406-w

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