Neurotoxicity of amphetamine derivatives is mediated by caspase pathway activation in rat cerebellar granule cells

Revisiting oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction in the pathogenesis of Parkinson disease—resemblance to the effect of amphetamine drugs of abuse

“…Methamphetamine and DͲamphetamine have been shown to increase ROS levels upon in vitro [307,308] or in vivo [309,310] exposure and the toxic effects of these drugs may be prevented by antioxidants. Moreover, in methamphetamine human abusers the activity of antioxidant enzymes was affected in several regions of the brain [311].…”

Cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in the neurotoxicity of opioid and psychostimulant drugs

“…The activation of caspases upon amphetamine exposure has been reported in the rat frontal cortex (Warren et al, 2007) and medium spiny striatal neurons (Krasnova et al, 2005) of exposed animals, as well as in rat cortical neurons (Cunha-Oliveira et al, 2006a), rat cerebellar granule cells (Jimenez et al, 2004) and PC12 cells . Caspase activation mediated by D-amphetamine or methamphetamine has been suggested to be mediated by the mitochondrial apoptotic pathway, as indicated by the observation of cytochrome c release Jimenez et al, 2004), accompanied by a decrease in mitochondrial potential (Cunha-Oliveira et al, 2006a), and a decrease in Bcl-2/Bax levels (Krasnova et al, 2005;Imam et al, 2001). Moreover, Bcl-2 overexpression was shown to protect mesencephalic immortalized cells from methamphetamine-induced apoptosis (Cadet et al, 1997).…”

Acute administration of fenproporex increased acetylcholinesterase activity in brain of young rats

“…Consumption of a low daily dose, 10 mg, of fenproporex led to the detection of amphetamine, within 3 hours, in urine with peak urinary levels greater than 4.0 ng/mL (Cody et al 1986 Rezin et al 2011, Feier et al 2012, changes in Na+, K+-ATPase activity (Rezin et al 2013) and mitochondrial apoptotic pathway through cytochrome c release (Oliveira et al 2003, Jiménez et al 2004). ACh as a neurotransmitter has a crucial role in the central nervous system and is implicated in behavioral as well as learning and memory and neurodegenerative diseases (Berger-Sweeney et al 2003, Schliebs andArendt 2006).…”