A selective loss of somatostatin in the hippocampus of patients with temporal lobe epilepsy
- 1 March 1991
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Wiley in Annals of Neurology
- Vol. 29 (3), 325-332
- https://doi.org/10.1002/ana.410290316
Abstract
Although neuropeptides have been demonstrated to be hippocampal neuromodulators in laboratory animals, their role in human hippocampal physiology or pathophysiology remains to be defined. The concentrations of somatostatin, cholecystokinin octapeptide, vasoactive intestinal polypeptide, and dynorphin A 1-17 were determined in hippocampal tissue resected from patients with cryptogenic temporal lobe epilepsy, a common seizure disorder originating in or near the hippocampus. Control tissue was obtained from cadavera or epilepsy patients in whom the hippocampus was removed during the resection of temporal lobe tumors. Peptide determinations were performed on extracts of punch biopsy specimens taken from six different hippocampal regions. A significant decrease in immunoreactive somatostatin concentration was identified in the dentate gyrus and in region cornu ammonis 4 of cryptogenic temporal lobe epilepsy specimens. No significant changes were present in any other hippocampal region or in the levels of other peptides. In situ hybridization studies performed on cryostat sections from similar patients confirmed a marked loss of neurons expressing the somatostatin gene, which was restricted to the dentate hilus. The density of specific 125I-somatostatin binding to cryostat sections, as determined by semiquantitative in vitro autoradiography, was significantly increased in the dentate gyrus of the cryptogenic epilepsy patients, compared with tumor control specimens. We conclude that a loss of somatostatin-producing interneurons with an upregulation of dentate somatostatin receptors is a specific and characteristic element in the pathophysiology of human crytogenic temporal lobe epilepsy.Keywords
This publication has 49 references indexed in Scilit:
- Optimized survival of hippocampal neurons in B27‐supplemented neurobasal™, a new serum‐free medium combinationJournal of Neuroscience Research, 1993
- Neuronal localization of prosomatostatin mRNA in the rat brain with in situ hybridization histochemistryJournal of Comparative Neurology, 1988
- Ultrastructural characterization and GAD Co‐localization of somatostatin‐like immunoreactive neurons in CA1 of rabbit hippocampusSynapse, 1988
- Cholinergic innervation of hippocampal GAD‐ and somatostatin‐immunoreactive commissural neuronsJournal of Comparative Neurology, 1987
- Somatostatin receptors: Distribution in rat central nervous system and human frontal cortexJournal of Comparative Neurology, 1985
- Measurement of cholecystokinin octapeptide using a new specific radioimmunoassayPeptides, 1985
- Access to the Posterior Medial Temporal Lobe Structures in the Surgical Treatment of Temporal Lobe EpilepsyNeurosurgery, 1984
- The actions of motilin, luteinizing hormone releasing hormone, cholecystokinin, somatostatin, vasoactive intestinal peptide, and other peptides on rat cerebral cortical neuronsCanadian Journal of Physiology and Pharmacology, 1980
- Is somatostatin an excitatory transmitter in the hippocampus?Nature, 1978
- Estimation of nuclear population from microtome sectionsThe Anatomical Record, 1946