Antiamnesic Effects of <i>Desmodium gangeticum</i> in Mice

Abstract

Dementia is a mental disorder characterized by loss of intellectual ability su‹ciently severe enough to interfere with one's occupational or social activities. Desmodium gangeticum commonly known as Salparni, is widely used in ayurveda for the treatment of neurological disorders. The present work was designed to assess the potential of aqueous extract of D. gangeticum (DG) as a nootropic agent in mice. DG (50, 100 and 200 mg/kg, p.o.) was administered for 7 successive days to both young and older mice. Exteroceptive behavioral models such as elevated plus maze and passive avoidance paradigm were employed to evaluate learning and memory. Scopolamine (0.4 mg/kg, i.p.) induced amnesia and ageing induced amnesia were the interoceptive behavioral models. To delineate the mechanism by which DG exerts nootropic activity, the eŠect of DG on whole brain AChE activity was also assessed. Piracetam (200 mg/kg, i.p.) was used as a standard nootropic agent. Pretreatment with DG (50, 100 and 200 mg/kg p.o.) for seven successive days signiˆcantly improved learning and memory in mice and reversed the amnesia induced by both, scopolamine (0.4 mg/kg, i.p.) and natural ageing. DG also decreased whole brain acetyl cholinesterase activity. Hence, D. gangeticum appears to be a promising candidate for improving memory and it would be worthwhile to explore the potential of this plant in the management of dementia and Alzheimer disease.

Pharmacological evidences for antiamnesic potentials of Phyllanthus amarus in mice

“…Passive Avoidance Behavior based on negative reinforcement was used to examine the long-term memory (Sharma and Kulkarni, 1990;Joshi et al, 2006a). The apparatus consisted of a box (27 cm × 27 cm × 27 cm) having three walls of wood and one wall of Plexiglass, featuring a grid floor (made up of 3 mm stainless steel rods set 8 mm apart), with a wooden platform (10 cm × 7 cm × 1.7 cm) in the center of the grid floor.…”

Antioxidant activities of phenolic components from various plants of Desmodium species

“…For example, Desmodium gangeticum has been demonstrated to possess antioxidant, anti-nociceptive, anti-inflammatory (Govindarajan et al, 2007;Rathi et al, 2004), antiemetic (Joshi and Parle, 2007), cardioprotective (Kurian and Philip, 2005), and anti-ulcer effects (Dharmani et al, 2005).…”

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“…Desmodium gangeticum (L.) DC. (Fabaceae): Its aqueous extract reversed scopolamine induced amnesia by decreasing whole brain AChE activity [42].…”