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Rifampicin and Parkinson’s disease

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Abstract

Rifampicin is a macrocyclic antibiotic used extensively for the treatment of Mycobacterium tuberculosis and other mycobacterial infections. Recently, it was discovered that rifampicin exhibits neuroprotective effects. It has been shown to protect PC12 cells against MPP+-induced apoptosis and inhibit the expression of α-synuclein multimers. In in vitro studies, rifampicin pretreatment protects PC12 cells against rotenone-induced cell death. Qualitative and quantitative analyses uncover that rifampicin significantly suppresses rotenone-induced apoptosis by ameliorating mitochondrial oxidative stress. It reduces microglial inflammation and improves neuron survival. Our results indicate that rifampicin is cytoprotective under a variety of experimental conditions, and suggest that it may be useful in PD therapeutics. It is the aim of this paper to review the experimental neuroprotection data reported using rifampicin with a focus on the molecular and cellular mechanisms of cytoprotective effect in in vitro models of PD.

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Acknowledgments

This work was funded by the Guangdong Provincial Department of Science and Technology (0400935505B33801003) and the Ph.D. Programs Foundation of Ministry of Education of China (No. 20070558257).

Conflict of interest

This paper is free of conflicts of interest. We declare that we have no financial or personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately bias our work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Neurology, Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, 510120, People’s Republic of China

    Wei Bi, Xiuna Jing, Yanran Liang & Enxiang Tao

  2. Department of Neurology, First Affiliated Hospital of Jinan University, Guangzhou, 510632, People’s Republic of China

    Wei Bi

  3. Joint Laboratory for Brain Function and Health of Jinan University and the University of Hong Kong, School of Medicine, Jinan University, Guangzhou, 510632, People’s Republic of China

    Lihong Zhu

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  1. Wei Bi
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Correspondence to Enxiang Tao.

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Bi, W., Zhu, L., Jing, X. et al. Rifampicin and Parkinson’s disease. Neurol Sci 34, 137–141 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10072-012-1156-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10072-012-1156-0

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